By Erin Wiltgen
chh@heraldsun.com; 918-1035
CHAPEL HILL -- A little bit of green never hurt anybody. In fact, it could actually improve quality of life, both for humans and the environment.
At the Durham Technical Community College's Orange County campus, administrators seek to grow their green initiative program this year. Beginning this spring, the school will dabble in organic agriculture classes in addition to the solar technology and sustainable landscaping programs it already has established.
This growing green environment caught the eye of author and solar heater instructor Steven Hren. He approached the school and asked to be a part of the growing program.
"He knew that we were doing a lot of new green programs, and he wanted to be involved," said Jacequeline Mitchell, Durham Tech program coordinator.
Steven Hren's involvement embodied offering a solar heater class, a program he has offered at other community colleges and which has been popular, Mitchell said.
"We're hoping to jump on that bandwagon," she said. "We're very fortunate to have him."
Hren's class begins this Saturday and embodies a do-it-yourself approach.
"I'm a hands-on guy, so I don't like to sit around and worry about something," Hren said. "I like to say that, 'OK, there's this problem and maybe this isn't going to save the world right here but if everybody did it, maybe it would.'"
The class teaches students the importance of solar heating. Hren said using solar heating is 60 to 70 percent more efficient.
"I'm really into appropriate technology and using the simplest thing," Hren said.
The other aspect of the class, the hands-on part, involves actually teaching students to build a solar heater themselves.
"A lot of people haven't heard about it," Hren said. "They just don't realize that this is something that they can do. It's just getting the word out there."
Hren said this part of the class is important because it makes students feel that they have some control over how they affect the environment.
"I think it's empowering to do that sort of hands-on activity on a personal and cultural level," he said.
Having students build a solar heater will help them cut down on their power bills, something that has made the class very attractive.
"People are definitely looking for ways to lower their energy bills," Mitchell said "Plus people need to realize how to use this free energy source we have."
Classes like Hren's work to emphasize how people can save energy on their own and reinforce the importance of being environmentally conscious by saving fossil fuels.
"I think the two big things are the fact that they're killing the planet, and we're running out of them, and in that order," Hren said.
While there was a time when people could stick a straw in the ground and oil would come out, the energy it now takes to extract fossil fuels is almost as much as the energy they provide, Hren said. And sooner or later, those fuels are going to disappear.
"People don't realize that sooner or later we're going to use up the energy that we have if we don't start looking for alternative options," Mitchell said.
As passionate as Hren is about environmental issues, he said that interest started with his and his wife's thirst for independence.
"When we were younger, Rebekah and I were like, 'Wouldn't it be nice to live this life where we bought a place out in the woods and produced our own energy, had our own garden,'" Hren said.
While they had some environmental concerns, they were small to start and grew over time.
"The seriousness of the problem made us act even more on it and realize that it wasn't enough to just do it ourselves," he said. "We had to do what we could to convince other people to come along as well. We all live in the world together, same planet."
Hren's wife also works closely with the environmental movement and is the only registered solar electrician in all of the Southeast, Hren said.
And just as the Hrens started their environmental involvement together, they've carried on together. They both teach for Solar Energy International, and both will teach workshops through the Abundance Foundation in November.
The two also wrote a book together called "A Carbon-Free Home -- 36 Remodeling Projects to Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit," which came out in 2008. The book goes through every aspect of the house that uses some kind of fossil fuels, from propane to hot water, and explains how to use less.
"It seemed like all the literature was about building your own greenhouse from scratch," Hren said. "We're filling that hole for people so they didn't feel like they had to start from scratch."
Though making these changes to personal life may seem small, Hren said they're some of the most important things individuals can do.
"I think that people get overwhelmed by the fact that this is a huge global problem and that they personally therefore won't have an effect," Hren said. "When we feel like we're addressing this global problem in our own lives, you get more motivated."
