Zero Carbon – Zero Bills
To Stop Climate Change – Start at Home
Zero carbon homes save money, improve health and substantially cut emissions of carbon dioxide. I have cut the carbon dioxide emissions of my house (and swimming pool) to zero, I pay nothing for heating or electricity and our indoor air is clean and fresh. By following my “Fab Four” recipe, which is summarized below, you can do it too and help us get to net-zero carbon by 2050.
David Green is a scientist by training (BA in physics from Oxford University) and has spent his career in business (MBA from Harvard Business School) so we only did things to our house that made both energy sense and financial sense. I found that a lot of the conventional wisdom is wrong. What we did not do is as important as what we did do.
NEW FREE SERVICE! If you live in a single-family home in MA (that does not today have solar panels, heat pumps or an electric vehicle charged on the meter) you can now get a free customized 10-page “Zero Bills, Zero Carbon®” report that tells you the most cost-effective way to cut the carbon emissions on your home from entering only your address and type of heating fuel you use. Click here:
I regularly do free webinars called “Zero Carbon, Zero Bills” in conjunction with local environmental or sustainability organizations like towns or libraries. If you are part of a local group and would like to host a webinar please let me know at [email protected] I can take care of all the registration and hosting so all you need to do is add the audience. I give away a free copy of my book Zero Carbon Home to all attendees.
If you would like to see a recording of my last webinar (for Third Act) you can see it here by entering the passcode: +#yZ8MuW:
The slides for this webinar are here:
You can watch a recorded version of a prior webinar (which is longer and more comprehensive and includes EVs and the IRA subsidies) here:
Reviews of my “Zero Carbon, Zero Bills” webinar included, “Minute-for-minute, point-for-point, one of the best webinars I have ever attended. Thank you!”, “David is a true inspiration and asset to our community. He inspired us to get solar panels and a new front door”, “This is like a masterclass in ZeroCarbon”, “Thank you soooo much for the sensible advice and your fabulous resources!!” and, although this next comment is a little flowery, it does express the sentiment of many other comments, “Your contribution to Greening America is great and will probably help our survival as a species a bit longer than expected”.
I do all my webinars for free and every attendee gets my book for free too. I do this to try to help save the planet from global warming. If you are part of a local sustainability, environmental or energy conservation group and would like to host a webinar please contact me at: email David Green to arrange it. I can take care of all the arrangements for Zoom hosting and registration so all you need to have is an just add the audience!
Our house is a zero-carbon house. We have achieved net-zero carbon and done so profitably. We achieved this in 2019, a long time before the 2050 goal of “net-zero carbon”. We did it using off the shelf equipment installed by local contractors. It wasn’t even that hard to do. It is just like baking a cake. If you tried to bake a cake with no knowledge of the ingredients and quantities you would make a lot of bad cakes. But if you have a recipe to follow, anyone can make a good cake. It is the same with cutting carbon emissions and saving money on houses. It is a lot easier to follow a proven recipe. My recipe is proven by having been applied to about 50 different houses ranging from 1,500 square feet to 14,000 square feet, from 1790’s New England colonial farmhouses to brand-new construction designed to be energy efficient, and heated by every conceivable fuel. I have never failed to help people cut their carbon emissions and bills substantially.
I hope my Fab-Four recipe for going zero (explained in both the books and the free webinar) is detailed enough for you to cut your bills substantially and get to a zero-carbon footprint on your own. However, if you feel you need some further guidance in going zero, then please see my Zero Carbon® Home consulting service described below.
For several years I have consulted to homeowners who asked for my help in cutting their energy bills and carbon emissions. So far, I have helped about 50 homeowners to do so. A typical project used to cost the homeowner about $1,500 but I have invested in the software to cut down the time taken and I now offer the same service for $199. A free estimate is available by clicking the link above. Homeowners give me great reviews, like the following:
“Working with David Green was an absolute pleasure, he guided me through the process with his experience in lowering my energy expenses and my overall carbon footprint.” DS, Long Island, NY.
“I wholeheartedly endorse David Green as a home energy consultant. He used his expertise in energy efficiency to focus on cost-effective solutions. As a result of following his suggestions, my house has significantly reduced energy consumption along with improvement in the overall comfort of my home.” – LA, Westwood, MA.
“David Green is the most knowledgeable person I have found when it comes to giving advice on making the transition from a fossil fuel heating system to a heat pump system. David is friendly, warm, and thorough. He was focused on saving me money and, by looking strategically at my situation, he helped me realize that I did not need to replace my entire heating system, as I had originally thought. I highly recommend David as a consultant. He will enable you to make the best and most financially sensible decisions about insulation, heat pumps, and solar panels.” – RR, Arlington, MA.
“we found your report to be very helpful indeed!” – ML, Needham, MA
In addition to the investment returns of 15% after tax (sure beats my 401(k)!), according to a large body of academic research, our house price has increased by between 8% and 14%. Even the low-end estimate greatly exceeds what we invested in the Fab Four. Hence you no longer have to wait until the savings pay for the investment in the equipment, you can get your money back as soon as you sell your house. In fact, adding the Fab Four is now a good way to prepare your house for sale.
I have written three books on how to get to zero carbon, zero bills. You can get my first book, Zero Carbon® Home, for free by attending my free webinar. My second book, Zero Carbon® Pool is not available for free but you can buy it from this website. My third book, the Special COVID19 Stuck at Home Edition of Zero Carbon® Home you can get for free by entering the code COVID19 at checkout. All attendees at my highly-acclaimed webinars get a free copy of the e-book version (for iPad/Nook or Kindle) of my equally highly-acclaimed book Zero Carbon® Home. When Paul Hawken, the author of “Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming” reviewed the book he said, “Your book is terrific.” Bill McKibben has also endorsed the book as have many people I have helped to cut their bills and carbon emissions.
You can see a recording of one of my early webinars on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/9ee-rcrvlM4 This webinar includes an explanation of how the Fab Four work. In the next link, https://youtu.be/vz13y-MB23M you can watch my latest webinar which now includes electric vehicles (I own a Tesla Model S and a Ford F150 Lightning and two of our adult children own Ford Mustang Mach E’s) and the very generous subsides in the Inflation Reduction Act or IRA. To get the new material in I had to take out the explanations of how the Fab Four work.
Getting to a zero-carbon / net-zero home.
David Green’s “Fab Four” recipe for “making green by going green” i.e., making money by cutting your house’s carbon footprint to zero is:
- install 12″ of insulation in your attic and in the ceiling of your basement
- replace your AC units with heat pumps
- when you replace your windows, replace them with triple-glazed windows not double-glazed ones, or add low cost “fit-from-the-inside” window inserts
- install solar panels on your roof
To find out more about the fab four please click here: Fab four summary.
To see how much money we saved and how much carbon dioxide we cut with each one of the fab four, please click here: How much CO2 did we cut?
To see a free recorded version of David Green’s 45 minute webinar presentation “Zero Carbon® , Zero Bills” (followed by 45 minutes of Q&A), hosted on YouTube, that covers the fab four recipe, please click here: https://youtu.be/vz13y-MB23M
If the idea of watching a video for 90 minutes (even if it will probably save you thousands of dollars a year) makes you want to leave this web site then here are three shorter versions:
To download a pdf file of the slides for the original webinar (also for free), please click here: Webinar slides July 2021 – Compressed This pdf file is compressed to 3.2MB to make it easy to download, so the pictures are a little grainy. These slides are for my original Zero Carbon, Zero Bills webinar which includes the explanations for how the Fab Four work. For the slides to my new webinar (which incorporates both EVs and the subsidies in the IRA but does not include the explanations of how the Fab Four work), please click here:
I have also broken the original webinar into 6 bite-sized chunks, all hosted on YouTube, and all available for free:
- 1. Summary, 10 minutes.
- 2. Heat pumps, 5 minutes.
- 3. Insulation, 4 minutes.
- 4. Triple-glazed windows, 9 minutes.
- 5. Solar panels, 7 minutes.
- 6. Putting it all together, 5 minutes.
To read about the author, David Green who is both a bit of a techie geek and quite financially nerdy, please click here: About the author
To order a copy of David Green’s books, Zero Carbon® Home and Zero Carbon® Pool, please click here: Order the book
These are unsolicited comments I have received on the book:
“Your book is terrific.” Paul Hawken., San Francisco, California. Author of “Drawdown” and one of the world’s leading environmentalists.
“I thought the book was straightforward and clear” B. Mc., Middlebury, Vermont. Leader of 350.org Third Act and one of the world’s leading environmentalists.
“Wow that was an awesome book! Super informative on all aspects of the process to get to net zero. I’m very glad I read your book it is such a passion of mine I’ve been wanting to do this for years, you really inspired me to make it happen. Thank you.” D.S., Mastic, New York. Homeowner who is making a 46% per year return on investment by cutting his carbon footprint 38%.
“Absolutely loved the book. Very readable for the non-scientist. Fun, entertaining, quite educational for the scientist.” A.N., Weston, Massachusetts. Homeowner who is going zero on his house.
“Thank you so much for your effort and attention here. I feels so fortunate to have met you!” K.A., Arlington, Massachusetts. Homeowner who is going zero on her house.
“I’m very impressed the way you explained the technical terms, the Fab Four and your thoughts on them, leading you to your choice. I was also very surprised when reading the section about old architectural solutions, like verandas, pergolas, deciduous plants, etc. being very often forgotten. Really good stuff.” M.B., London, U.K. Homeowner who is going zero on his house.
David Green’s work on zero carbon houses has been publicized on global news media outlets including ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox and has appeared on the front cover of Green Energy Times, in the Boston Herald and in Renewable Energy World, as well as the websites of the U.S. Department of Energy, Zero Energy Project, Cool Effects and the Green Home Institute.
It is pure coincidence, or perhaps destiny, that my family name is Green. I got it from my father. I am not making it up, just like I am not making up anything else in this website, book or webinar.
Legal matters.
The books, reports, website (including blog posts), webinars, website downloads (including material emailed to you) and other form of communication (including the author’s answers to people’s questions in any form, written or oral) refer to the author’s opinions and experience with energy efficiency improvements, investing, tax, finance and regulations but neither the author, nor Zero Carbon® LLC is giving investment, tax, financial or legal advice, nor offering any warranty or guarantee of results.
The mark Zero Carbon® is a trademark of Zero Carbon® LLC registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office with numbers 5,730,207 and 5,944,678. Use without the written permission of Zero Carbon® LLC may be a violation of law. In addition, the trademark has been recorded with the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol to prevent the importation of articles bearing unlicensed versions of the trademark. For permission requests contact: email David Green
Copyright © 2020 to 2025 David Green. All rights reserved. No part of this publication, electronic or printed, may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. All commercial use is prohibited. All photographs and illustrations are copyright © David Green, unless otherwise credited.