Sustainable housing

Bantay Gobyerno
Ramon ‘Ike’ Villareal Señeres

The usual and customary interpretation of “sustainable housing” is usually understood in terms of the ability of the buyer to pay for his or her mortgage payments, and nothing else. I now would like to broaden the interpretation to mean being able to meet the other expenses that are related to the upkeep of the house and the maintenance of the day to day lifestyle of the occupants of the house, including their means to earn additional incomes as they engage in productive activities within the premises of their house.

Figuratively and practically speaking, almost every activity and facility inside the house is powered by “energy”, and understandably, energy costs account for most of the expenses that are related to the upkeep of the house, and the sustainability of the lifestyle of its occupants.

With the term energy, I would mean not just the electricity, but also the cooking fuels such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and in the case of some homes; it would also mean the kerosene gas that fuels their lamps and stoves. Generally speaking, most of the homes in our country are connected to the grid, except in some communities perhaps that may have already succeeded in generating their own power under the Independent Power Producer (IPP) law.

Depending on the local costs of electric energy, it would still be economical for most people to use LPG stoves instead of electric stoves. Depending on the local prices of kerosene gas, it is highly possible that the cost of maintaining kerosene stoves could even be higher than the costs of either electric stoves or LPG stoves. Ironically, it is also possible that in some places, the prices of firewood are so high such that the costs of maintaining the so-called “dirty kitchens” could actually be higher than having electric stoves, LPG stoves or kerosene stoves.

Here in the Philippines, in the usual and customary interpretation of the scope of “housing”, energy cooking fuels are usually understood to be “external” to the house itself. In many other countries however, gas lines are “built-in” inside the house, usually as part of a municipal gas system that also supplies gasses to fuel the street lamps. It would be fair to assume that in these countries, the costs of gasses fed through gas lines would be lower than the costs of using electricity for cooking, or for lighting the street lights. Here in Metro Manila, many still remember the fact that many years back, many homes were using gasses fed through gas lines by the Manila Gas Company.

Sad to say, it has practically become a “way of life” for everyone here in the Philippines to use LPG in canisters, not knowing perhaps that LPG and all other gasses could actually be delivered more efficiently and more economically through gas lines that are built-in into the homes and commercial establishments. Actually, the latter is now being done in many restaurants and fast food outlets, wherein the gasses are fed into the LPG
stoves by gas lines that are supplied by large storage tanks outside their premises. If this could be done in these establishments, it could also be done in subdivisions, condominiums and other housing types.

Here in the Philippines and all over the world, so much attention has been given to the advocacy of building “green” homes and “green” communities, but it appears that the “greening” goals so far does not
include sustainable energy on one hand, and renewable energy on the other hand. These are two mutually exclusive goals by the way, but it would be correct to say that renewable energy is definitely sustainable. In this sense, it is implied that sustainability is directly related to affordability, and it would seem that renewable energy sources are definitely more affordable than fossil based energy sources.

Needless to say, energy efficient homes are considered “green” homes, but in these modern times and up ahead in the future, energy is not the only utility that a productive home needs. Even now and more so up ahead, productive homes would need connectivity to internet and broadcast services providers, more so now that these two sets of providers are fast converging to just become one seamless industry. With new emerging trends that internet and broadcast services could now pass through power lines, the provision of energy and connectivity could eventually converge into one industry as well.

(The author is a broadcast journalist, syndicated columnist, political economist and computer technologist. He was formerly Director General of the National Computer Center and Chairman of the National Crime Information System)