Permaculture San Francisco

The Center for ReSource Conservation, formerly the Boulder Energy Conservation Center (BECC), was founded in 1976 by a group of community-minded citizens seeking ways to help reduce our dependence on non-renewable resources. The organization has since developed extensive expertise in the areas of green building, renewable energy, energy efficiency, waste reduction, and water conservation. We share practical solutions for environmental living through print and on-line communications materials, direct services, events, workshops, demonstration projects, tours, and walk-in/email/phone requests for information. Our goal is to tackle resource conservation issues close to home, provide accessible and affordable conservation solutions, and reduce the negative environmental impacts associated with non-sustainable practices. The Center for ReSource Conservation’s objective is to provide programs and services that empower individuals to turn natural resource conservation beliefs into action in their daily lives.

 

Each year, the CRC empowers more than 7,500 individuals to live a more sustainable life. The CRC reaches out to and engages these individuals through programming in its energy, water, and waste divisions:

The CRC’s Energy Division inspires action that advances energy efficiency, renewable energy, and energy conservation technologies and approaches. The energy division operates the energy and green building hotline, provides residential energy audits, and hosts educational seminars, conferences, and tours, including the annual Tour of Solar and Green Built Homes. During 2008, the residential energy audit program alone will prevent approximately 50,000 tons of greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere.

The CRC’s Water Division develops and implements educational programs and services that help residents increase water use efficiency, adhere to best management practices, and reach conservation goals. The water division offers educational seminars on irrigation systems and xeric gardens, provides irrigation system inspections, and sells professionally designed, low cost xeric gardens to the public. Each year, the xeric garden program helps to convert 40,000 square feet of high-water-use landscape to xeriscape.

The CRC's Waste Division, ReSource, promotes waste reduction through innovative landfill diversion programs. ReSource retail locations in Boulder and Fort Collins along with the ReSource Deconstruction Program salvage used building materials and resell them to the public ($700,000 in revenues annually), making it possible to reuse and recycle 2 million pounds of materials annually that would otherwise have been discarded during construction and demolition and basic remodeling projects.