These greenhouses grow from friends of the earth

clipped from www.palmbeachpost.com John Eriksen admits it. He's obsessed with energy consumption. When he flips on the eight-bulb light fixture in the bathroom of his Okeechobee home, the hand-held tracking device in his grip shows his costs per kilowatt hour spike from 2 cents to 10 cents. On the metal roof of his house, ultra-thin laminated strips of photovoltaic cells collect power from the sun. Eriksen gets a kick out of watching the watts stream in. And he gets a credit on his monthly Florida Power & Light Co. bill for the 10 kilowatts or so he generates daily, a little less than what he uses. Eriksen expects rebates and incentives to cover $12,000 of the $17,000 to $18,000 costs of the solar system and other green elements he built into his 1,600-square-foot home. Since the solar power will shave roughly $30 to $35 a month from his power bill, he estimates the remainder will pay for itself in about a decade. John Eriksen, behind his solar-powered Okeechobee home