As Europe leads the way in environmentally-friendly practices and design, more innovation is providing the United States, among other countries, with better ideas and efficiency. Europe has a variety of companies that sell energy efficient glass for residential use while America maintains merely one. This new discovery promotes further investigation, which delineates that smaller cars are produced by American car companies especially for Germany, and that the “Feed-In Tariffs” paid Germany and Spain’s homeowners to install solar power panels on roofs.

More insulation means less or virtually no heating is necessary with the onset of Obama’s “Cash for Caulkers” program. With Europe’s carbon footprint being half the size of the United States’ carbon footprint, this is good news. Sweden’s economy grew 44% with greenhouse gas emissions reduction.

The PassivHaus energy efficiency standard developed in Germany is far stricter than the US’ own LEED standards. It actively defines the characteristics of a Passive House and the comprehensive structure details that it must be “a very well -insulated, virtually air-tight building that is primarily heated by passive solar gain and by internal gains from people, electrical equipment, etc.”

By Tiffany Teng. Tiffany can be reached at teng3@tcnj.edu.