Spy satellites against carbon emissions.

September 15, 2007 9:31 PM

Aerial building heat loss maps. Haringey Council has contracted with Hot Mapping and Horton Levi to put a searchable heat loss map online for every building in the London Borough of Haringey. The thermal images were collected using overflights with a military style imager. The council's hope is that residents with hot buildings will take steps to reduce the amount of energy being leaked to the environment.
posted by Mitheral (19 comments total)

Also, if you have any indoor hydroponic "gardens", beware!
posted by mrnutty at 9:33 PM on September 15, 2007

Just raise the price of fuel to include the cost to recover. Make people pay the actual price for what they do.
posted by delmoi at 9:51 PM on September 15, 2007

I'm glad to see Haringey have solved all other problems in their borough.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 10:14 PM on September 15, 2007

So that's how the U.S. really measures red and blue states: by the Hot Air Index.
posted by cenoxo at 10:47 PM on September 15, 2007 [1 favorite]

LOLPOORINSULATION.
posted by Kadin2048 at 11:26 PM on September 15, 2007

Just raise the price of fuel to include the cost to recover. Make people pay the actual price for what they do.

Spoken like someone who doesn't live in the UK. Do you have any idea how expensive gas is here? Let me put it in perspective for you. I pay more two heat a two bedroom flat here than I did to heat a 130 year old 7 bedroom house in Ontario. This in a climate where the winter avg is -2.
posted by srboisvert at 12:12 AM on September 16, 2007

delmoi writes "Just raise the price of fuel to include the cost to recover. Make people pay the actual price for what they do."

Shame might work where pure economics doesn't. You think Bill Gates would be concerned over his heating bill even if gas went to $100 GigaJoule?

Even if the council is unsuccessful in getting even one person to change, the application of GIS and infra red imaging is cool.
posted by Mitheral at 12:30 AM on September 16, 2007

Britain Big Brother Spots Energy Wasters (and Wants Your DNA, Too)
posted by homunculus at 1:01 AM on September 16, 2007

Shame might work a little, initially, but if you're already living in a mansion -- practically the definition of "conspicuous consumption" if there ever was one -- why are you going to get worked up over people knowing that you're blowing energy out the window? If you can rationalize having a huge house, it ought to be easy to rationalize having tons of plate-glass windows, or a heated outdoor pool, or whatever. Eventually, having a 'red house' just becomes part of the upper-class milieu.

The people I can see this affecting are the ones who are in the middle class and don't live any better, particularly, than their neighbors, and for whom there is extensive social pressure on to not waste for the sake of wasting. But those are the same people, I think, who are going to respond to price increases.
posted by Kadin2048 at 1:25 AM on September 16, 2007

I can almost see my old house from here!
posted by armoured-ant at 3:18 AM on September 16, 2007

Residents with hot buildings or owners with hot buildings? Because 21,000 of these homes (although probably not, of course, anything like 21,000 separate buildings) are owned by Haringey Council, and are probably (I don't know, I'm not a social scientist) more likely than average to be occupied by those less able to pay for improvements and/or less able to negotiate the bureaucratic mess involved in trying to get free/cheap insulation. But I could just be still bitter about having woken up to find ice on the inside of my window when I was staying in a single-glazed Housing Association flat (but not in Haringey).
posted by Lebannen at 3:22 AM on September 16, 2007

Also, if you have any indoor hydroponic "gardens", beware!

Funnily enough, the second Google result for "'grow op' 'thermal imaging'" is an article about the same London borough, but refers to the use of a hand-held device.
posted by tomcooke at 7:55 AM on September 16, 2007

I've heard that in Amsterdam the government takes infrared images of roof tops to see who has indoor hydroponic gardens.
posted by nickyskye at 8:15 AM on September 16, 2007

I'd love to see a mashup of this map and one of income levels in the county. I'd be willing to bet the lower the income level, the worse the heat waste. Cheaper build, less disposable income for repairs and such. Without considering this possibility, the people advocating raising the cost of gas risk enacting a regressive tax scheme.
posted by puddnhead at 9:23 AM on September 16, 2007

I got paid to upgrade my old furnace.

Well, rebated, anyway. The gas company gave me a thousand bucks towards replacing my old furnace, which was probably heading toward 20% efficiency given its age and design, for a new 90-something% efficient furnace.

Next up is to see whether there's money for a green roof, solar cells, or new high-efficiency windows.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:25 AM on September 16, 2007

The feds and Hydro are handing out all sorts of incentives FFF.
posted by Mitheral at 11:17 AM on September 16, 2007

Bitchin! Thanks, man.
posted by five fresh fish at 12:29 PM on September 16, 2007

As a tax paying resident of Haringey, I'd like to say that this council is a pus-ridden boil, filled with crackhouses and populated by multiple ASBO winners. My fucking property value is going down faster than that girl that hangs out next to the Off License. Not to mention the gangs of thugs roaming the area, Rottweilers in tow, kicking over rubbish bins and cranking shitty hip-hop from tiny mobile phone speakers.

It's good to know they've got my house's heat loss situation sorted. That was really keeping me up at night.
posted by Optamystic at 4:11 PM on September 16, 2007 [1 favorite]

ASBO. Images of ASBOs published on a police site.

But there has also been British government spying on people's garbage bins! Talk about Big Brother gone nuts.
posted by nickyskye at 5:05 AM on September 17, 2007