EleBlog

22 Dec, 2007

A Wall Street Journal writer who is worthy of respect has written a piece -- for Portfolio magazine (a relatively new pub) -- on the commercial mortgage securities market. Yes, COMMERCIAL, not residential.

["Worthy of respect?" Yes. I base that assessment on reading a lot of his previous stuff.]

Someone name of Felix Salmon wrote a follow-up -- featuring a link to that WSJ piece AND a follow-up Q-and-A with the WSJ writer. Headline: "Illiquidity and Insolvency in the Commercial Real Estate Market."

Here's one piece of an answer:


. . . so there is not only WORSE to come on the housing side, there is MUCH WORSE to come on the commercial side. Manomanoman!

22 Dec, 2007

Note that there's a new banner here, heralding (excuse the Xmas carol word!!!) the appearance in the DC-MD-VA area in February of MIKE HOLT at two Code seminars. He's a friend of mine and he's appearing for a customer of mine, Capital Lighting & Supply. Click on it if you're local -- either event will be worth your while.

22 Dec, 2007

I've been doing a lot of GREEN BUILDING stuff lately. It's a long story. To be immodest, I'm writing stuff on Green and doing some speaking on Green topics (with more to come). To be frank, I'm goshdarn LUCKY. My background (6 years in the waste industry, founding editor of Recycling Times -- which is now defunct -- blahblahblah) was a perfect prep for the current popularity of green.

Along those lines, I think this graphic might be worth a "listen" . . .


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22 Dec, 2007

I like to think of myself as having some expertise on construction, the electrical construction business, the datacom/wiring/wireless business, electrical distribution, the distriubtion business, energy, and all sorts of other stuff. In reality, it's impossible to know everything (much less everyone!) about ANY one of these things . . . much less all of them.

I have been following HOUSING -- closely. I've read up on it, tried to discriminate between the real baloney and the tofu, and so forth.

This graphic shocked me. It comes from here -- the write attributes it to Credit Suisse.

Does it "say" that the housing crisis is going to last until 2012? NO, it does not say that. The writer (click through on that link) says "perhaps we get a bounce in 2009 before the final collapse heading into 2012."

Wow!

22 Dec, 2007

It's hard to believe that a big % of the folks out there think we're either already IN a recession (I'm in that group), about to enter one (a lot of folks think this), or that the odds that we'll enter one in 2008 are pretty good . . . and yet oil prices are still over $90 per barrel of crude.

Here's why --

a. Failure.

b. Disbelief.

c. Control.

We'll deal with (b) and (c) at another time.

The graphic below (from the DOE's Energy Information Administration) shows off Exhibit A -- all about Failure. Collectively, the oil industry is exploring more, but enjoying it less. That's unrewarding.

19 Dec, 2007

New energy rules in the law President Bush signed today are going to result in the phase-out of the incandescent bulb. I predict a thriving black market. I plan to buy 17 or 20 gigantic warehouses (there's a lot of industrial space of size for sale in Detroit, I understand) and stockpile incandescent bulbs for sale as collector's items in the future.

"Pssst . . . hey, buddy . . . wanna buy an outlaw bulb? It's great -- you can actually SEE with this light, no flicker. And it gives off plenty of heat!"

Here's the picture, as painted by a Reuters service item today:


EleBlog prediction: Increasing sales of aspirin in the 2015-2020 period, to battle numerous headaches caused by insufficient light quality. I'm hoping that WON'T happen . . . as it should (I hope) be . . . "LEDs to the rescue!"

19 Dec, 2007

. . . and what make this freakin' uglier is that . . . it could get a lot worse.

18 Dec, 2007

"Why Partnership Agreements Are Important for Low-Voltage and Electrical Contractors" is an 872-word piece posted to CEpro.com. The author is the owner of a security company in Kansas. He writes:

From my experience, electricians really become discouraged because they are not adequately trained in the low-voltage area. Just because a person understands the lower-voltage does not mean they have the expertise to work with the nominal voltages.

Similarly, a low-voltage contractor would have a steep learning curve. Added time within the field would be necessary in order to become a licensed journeyman, master and/or electrical contractor.

The electrical contractor has the advantage in this area because they have already earned the field experience and licenses.

Since the electrician has already been trained in the electrical field, the curve is not as steep to upgrade with low-voltage education. Low-voltage licensing is typically connected to being certified from an association in the low-voltage industry.

A partnership also provides benefits regarding salesmanship and presentation. A low-voltage contractor typically has great sales experience and product education, whereas the electrical contractor does not.

This short article is certainly worth your time!

18 Dec, 2007

EleBlog carries a few ads, but no one pays for the blog entries here. So this one sounds a bit commercial (and is, I guess). But you really ought to know about EnOcean.

18 Dec, 2007

An item on Building Online summarizes (and provides a link to) a webcast featuring an EPA fella (a licensed architect) talking about energy efficiency, homebuilding, and myths.

18 Dec, 2007

A few tidbits about CFLs and LEDs:

1A -- I ran across an 800-word Newsweek story on "Edison's Dimming Bulbs" from mid-October. I don't read that publication unless I'm in a waiting room somewhere (like a doctor's office). The article credits Wal-Mart.

I'm no fan of CFLs. I'm a big fan of LEDs. I think the movement -- in some places -- to ban the incandescent bulb is going to spur a black market!!!

1B -- The magazine article turns out to have been an opinion piece. Here's something totally inane from the opinionator:


This is interesting to me. First, CFLs have been around for a while; the person who wrote this apparently just fell off the turnip truck. The carrot IS NOT working -- that's why there are incentives (to get people to try the CFLs), giveaways (sponsored by some local utilities) . . . and now the threat of a ban. THINK!


2 -- at EcoBuild Fall last week (an event held here in D.C. in December and someplace out West in May), I was chatting with a guy who does local energy conservation work. He told me about a horrid installation where he found in place CFLs in an outdoor installation. They weren't working (surprise!). The reason: Bad application. I am virtually certain that there's a lot more of this out there.


3 -- a company in North Carolina, LED Lighting Fixtures, has -- according to a report in The News & Observer (of Raleigh) -- had a breakthru in LED technology.

Re-read that carefully. The new LED product will use "less than 30%" of the energy needed by fluorescents.

18 Dec, 2007

CB Richard Ellis, which is a rather large real estate company (with 1,000 buildings under management), said in November (I'm playing catch-up here) that it would take 100 buildings and enroll them under the LEED-EB standard, under the LEED "Porfolio Program." There's some info here.

LEED = Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design. EB = existing buildings. LEED is a program of the U.S. Green Buildings Council.

According to the story linked, there were only 300 buildings registered LEED-EB by the end of last year, and only 600 as of 5/07. That makes a one-shot-deal for 100 significant, doesn't it?

18 Dec, 2007

Facility Care magazine is having an audio conference (1/17/08) on The Digital Hospital. I really am enamored of the concept, the three-word encapsulation of it, and the description that follows. Forgive me for regurgitating it here, but it's neat.

18 Dec, 2007

A headline from Atlanta: "Nuke plants may be pricier than expected."

So what? We need to at least reduce natural gas imports. We need -- at least -- to continue to grow as an economy (which requires electricity) . . . without burning more coal (at least until the coal solutions under consideration get sorted out).

And we may need to move to PHEVs (plug-in hybrid electric vehicles) . . . to reduce our reliance on imported oil.

We can't do that without nuclear power. I'm a big fan of nuclear as a part of THE solution -- even tho, yes, I am a tree-hugger. But I recognize that:


This is a problem that can be solved with intelligent application of large hordes of money. It beats all hell out of going to war to protect our energy lifeline (which also costs a lot of money, as well as blood).

Common sense tells you we need nukes. A little bit of deep thinking tells you that the faster we implement a plan to build a lot of nuclear power plants -- safely and with proper waste disposal built-in to the plan -- the faster we'll put nearly 40 years of energy stupidity behind us.

15 Dec, 2007

"The entire energy complex has to be managed, not just a slice or two," says Steve Wilhite, president and CEO of Summit Energy in Louisville, Ky., a firm that provides natural gas, electricity and alternative-fuel-management plans. "The purchasing organization needs to be in control of what and how much is being consumed and exactly how much purchased energy has cost."

Which brings us back to the individual strategies and tactics buyers like Bunton, Steagall, Meyers, Kopera, McDonald and others employ. Here are 19 suggestions from them and others on steps for saving money in energy purchases and energy use."

. . . the cover story of the 11/15/07 issue of Purchasing.

15 Dec, 2007

Before making a plant-floor networking error of biblical proportions, here are 10 commandments for applying Ethernet for control applications, according to Scott J. Johnson, product marketing specialis for Rockwell Automation. (More)

15 Dec, 2007

"10 Ideas for Coping with Rising Construction Costs." -- from School Construction News.

15 Dec, 2007

The 2007 Top 10 Green Building Products. "This sixth annual award, announced at the U.S. Green Building Council’s Greenbuild Conference in Chicago, recognizes the most exciting products drawn from additions to the GreenSpec Directory and coverage in Environmental Building News."

15 Dec, 2007

Energy Star Top 10 List -- the top 10 tools the EPA has developed/gathered "to make your lives easier (or at least make your facilities less expensive to operate)." -- from Industry Week.

14 Dec, 2007

Employment of production workers (foremen, journeymen, apprentices, helpers, etc.) by electrical contractors has been at a six-year high each month since March 2007. For example, October's 750,600 (subject to revision) was higher than each October from 2002 to 2006.

But something else: October 2001's employment figure was 755,900. The 2007 # isn't all that far away. In fact, that's as close as 2007 has been to 2001 (which was a pretty good year for electrical contractors).

The October 2000 figure, in the midst of the boom, was 778,900.

Footnote: Why do we have November figures for construction, but only October figures for ECs? The subcontractor reports are always one month behind.

14 Dec, 2007

As noted in the item just above, construction employment has been roughly level with (actually, slightly down) 2006 during most of 2007. Yet that didn't prevent the Bureau of Labor Statistics from tinkering with its Birth/Death job model (found here).

According to that model, 112,000 net jobs were estimated-into-existance in the construction industry by the BLS so far in 2007.

No one can know if that's correct or off-base. But I have the strong feeling that it's a huge pile of Baloney.

14 Dec, 2007

Bureau of Labor Statistics data (preliminary - subject to revision) for November shows employment of "production workers" in the construction industry falling in November -- by 2.29% from October. By itself, that's not a huge factolito.

However, employment fell also from November 2006 -- albeit by a hair (0.57%) -- from 5,950,000 to 5,916,000. It's the 7th month (out of 11, obviously) in which 2007 construction employment has failed to match 2007 levels. YES, the huge hit to the residential market is part of this -- but as a special BLS report (covered on EleBlog) noted, much of the residential collapse DID NOT show up in BLS employment data . . . because many of the people shed were illegals.

By itself, this fall-in-employment in construction is not huge news. But: See the next item.

12 Dec, 2007

I wasn't aware that Plant Engineering magazine has had a long-runnin series on "The Art of Protecting Electrical Systems." The mag is up to Part 14 (!!!). The link at left takes you to that article, which is titled "Single-Phase Short Circuit Calculations: A Step-by-Step Guide."

Notes:

a. The article printed out at 13 pages on my computer. I use smaller type, as I still (for some reason) still have excellent vision (my hearing has gone to hell, tho).

b. If you get to the bottom of the thing, there are links to the previous 13 installments in this series.

12 Dec, 2007

Human beings aren't comfortable making the change to working in green data centers, according to an article (12/3) posted on the site of Network World -- "Green buildings make employees see red."


Here's a tiny slice of the griping from the article:

Green buildings also have fewer electrical outlets so employees can’t plug in their own coffee pots, hotplates, microwaves or refrigerators. Forget about personal heaters, fans or desk lamps, too.

"Mr. Coffee uses about 1000 watts when it is brewing, and it cycles on and off. It’s 250 watts of constant power if you’re keeping a hotplate warm," Long says. "We have rules that allow no more than two coffee pots for every dozen or so people."

"Our employees are not supposed to have coffee pots, heaters or refrigerators in their personal workspaces. It’s a constant fight," Pegnato says. "We probably get 90% success on that."

EleBlog take: Either going "green" is a PR move or it is a transition to a different relationship between humans and energy use. The NW article is excellent -- not because the EleBlog is "anti-green" . . . but because it identifies issues that need to be overcome for us to successfully make this transition.
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12 Dec, 2007

I'm a believer in the future of prefabrication -- and modular construction. Not just of homes, but of commercial buildings, too. There are a lot of reasons, including:


If you start to think about modularizing building construction, you end up seeing a different type of future for electrical work. I've thought a lot about it (since 1999). I'll try to get more up on this site over time.

For now, see the article "Three Buildings Say Prefab Costs Less, Delivers More" in the 12/3 Nation's Building News (the weekly from NAHB). The Q-and-A does not deal with electrical, but here's an interesting piece:

We had minimal, if any, damage on about 400 homes throughout the state during the last two hurricanes in Florida. A study done by FEMA found that when Hurricane Andrew came through in the ’90s, modular construction held up much better than site-built construction because of the engineering and the flexibility, particularly in the roof sections.

12 Dec, 2007

An article from Investor's Business Daily, posted to Yahoo! Finance, is headlined: "Power-Saving Lighting Firm Rolls Out Next 'Green' IPO." Orion Energy Systems "is offering a version of green energy," the IBD article says.

Actually, the company is in the business of doing lighting retrofits.

12 Dec, 2007

Trying to catch up on the information flow in the past few days, I ended up scanning (I did not say "reading") the printed issues of Transmission & Distribution World, Public Power, EnergyBiz, and Utility/T&D AUtomation & Engineering. So while The EleBlog isn't dedicated to the utility business, here's a bit of stuff that caught my eye:

Xcel Switches to Soy-Based Transformers -- beginning in '08, Xcel Energy will use "renewable soy-based dielectric coolant in all new single-phase transformers." The coolant is from Cooper Power System. This is a "green" thing, kinda. But unlike so much of the "green" stuff these days, the movement in the direction of soy-based coolant didn't start yesterday.

IEEE PES Launches Career Website to Address Critical Worker Shortage -- http://www.PES-Careers.org.

Comment: It's not bad, but I prefer http://www.ElectrifyingCareers.com. Of course, I've been involved in the latter since its inception.

"Chronology" of the AEP Wyoming-Jackson Ferry 765 kV transmission line -- this is a one-third-page box sidebar in a feature. It took American Electric Power 16 years to get this project from announcement to fruition. It's important to remember that this is a typical experience in the business of rebuilding and fortifying the U.S. electrical grid. The story doesn't say that but it makes the point just the same.

"Plug-In Partners Get Plugged In" -- yet another article about the PHEV (plug-in hybrid electrical vehicle). A 3-page article. There is a lot of agitating in the electric utility business these days about PHEVs. I don't see it elsewhere; I guess we will sooner or later. The beauty of PHEVs for the utes is:

a. PHEVs can plug in to a "normal" wall outlet to recharge. When I was last acquainted with this concept, the word was we'd have to build (and bring power to) millions of recharging stations.

b. The utilities get to sell power in the downtime -- night. That's very efficient for them (or rather, it makes their operations a lot more efficient).

There are hurdles. You are probably thinking -- "why buy a PHEV, when the Toyota Prius is a hybrid that doesn't need to be plugged in." That's a reasonable question. According to the article, "in mass production, Toyota could sell a plug-in version [of the Prius] for $3,000 more." Why pay the premium? According to a genius quoted in the article, his converted Prius got 48 miles per gallon as a non-PHEV hybridg. Then he converted it, and he said it gets "over 100 mpg of gasoline" thanks to the electric recharge.

What does the electricity cost? A guy quoted claims he need a recharge of 3 to 5 kWh in the day and the same at night. He claims the cost is $7 per month where he lives.

06 Dec, 2007

October 07 Inflation Alert (16p PDF)
http://www.agc.org/galleries/economics/CIA08.pdf

Remodeling Activity Expected to Trend Down in 2008
(Joint Center for Housing Studies @ Harvard U.)
http://www.jchs.harvard.edu/media/lira/index.html

REGULARLY UPDATED

Construction Data + Commentary – frequently

The Data DIGest (Associated General Contractors of America)

http://www.agc.org/page.ww?section=Construction+Economic+News&name=Data+Digest

Housing Forecasts + Commentary – 2x/month

Eye On The Economy – NAHB’s David Seiders

http://www.nahbmonday.com/eyeonecon/issues

Monthly Construction Contracting Values Update

McGraw-Hill Construction

http://www.construction.com

Monthly "Construction Spending" (construction put-in-place) report

Census Bureau

http://www.census.gov/const/www/c30index.html

HOUSING – LONG-TERM

Projecting Underlying Demand for New Housing Units (50p PDF)
(Joint Center for Housing Studies @ Harvard U.)
http://www.jchs.harvard.edu/publications/markets/w07-7.pdf

REFERENCE

State-By-State Statistics - Click on the Map!
(Portland Cement Assn.)
http://www.cement.org/econ/ind_stats.asp

Quick Facts By State - Click on the Map!
(Associated General Contractors of America)
http://www.agc.org/page.ww?section=Construction+Economic+News&name=Quick+Facts%3A+U.S.+and+Selected+States

06 Dec, 2007

2008 Commercial Real Estate Forecast: A Bit Cloudy (Retail Traffic magazine)
http://retailtrafficmag.com/news/commercial_real_estate_assessment_1025/

Forecast: Slow Economy + Democratic White House (from National Real Estate Investor)
http://nreionline.com/news/economy_democratic_white_house/

Housing Woes Threaten Broader Economy (from National Real Estate Investor)
http://nreionline.com/finance/capital/report_us_conference_mayors/

Natl. Assn. of Realtors – Commercial Real Estate Outlook (62p PDF) - 11/13/07
http://www.realtor.org/Research.nsf/files/07AnnualCommForum.pdf/$FILE/07AnnualCommForum.pdf

The Next Shoe To Drop: Commercial Real Estate (Nouriel Roubini’s blog)
http://www.rgemonitor.com/blog/roubini/226654

06 Dec, 2007

Fannie Mae: Banks Tighten Credit Standards Even For Prime Mortgages (11/13/07)
http://tinyurl.com/2n3s4p

Fannie Mae: Monthly Economic Outlook (2p PDF) (11/13/07)
http://www.fanniemae.com/media/pdf/economics/monthly/2007/111307.pdf

Freddie Mac Monthly Market Outlook (1p PDF) (11/8/07)
http://www.freddiemac.com/news/finance/docs/Nov_2007_Public.pdf

Mortgage Bankers Association: Forecast (1p PDF) - 11/15/07 Forecast – Data Sheet
http://www.mortgagebankers.org/files/Bulletin/InternalResource/58151_.pdf

Nat. Assn. of Realtors – Economic Forecast (1p PDF) - Nov. 07 Forecast – Data Sheet
http://www.realtor.org/Research.nsf/files/currentforecast.pdf/$FILE/currentforecast.pdf

Home Builder + Home Building/Economic News Page (latest news, with links, from Builder magazine)
http://www.builderonline.com/industry-news-section.asp?sectionID=30

Annaly (mortgage company) Monthliy Commentary (3p PDF) (11/8/07)
http://www.annaly.com/mc/FIDACCommentary11-07.pdf

Annaly Q3 “News & Views” – "Seduced By A Super Model" - (2p PDF) (10/30/07)
http://www.annaly.com/mikeQ307webv.pdf

05 Dec, 2007

Don Leavens – NEMA economist -- presentation at September's Ebiz Forum
http://www.idea-esolutions.com/xres/ebiz/uploads/presentations/Don%20Leavens%20-%20Economic%20Outlook.pdf

Adam Fein’s blog entry – 2008 Economic Growth & You (11/28/07)
http://www.distributiontrends.com/2007/11/2008-economic-growth-and-you.html

Total U.S. Construction Spending – 1.7% in ’07 - And + 7.1% in 2008 – From Jim Haughey, Reed Construction Data – Oct. 07
http://www.buildingteamforecast.com/article/CA6491990.html?industryid=44206

Tables That Go With Haughey/Reed Verbiage Above
http://www.buildingteamforecast.com/article/CA6491989.html?industryid=44206

Video: Commercial Construction Forecast (CNBC-TV) -- featuring Kermit Baker, AIA’s economist
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=597595814&play=1

Portland Cement Association – Outlook ‘08 (multimedia presentation)
http://www.cement.org/econ/

05 Dec, 2007

CBO: The Current Economic Situation (34p PDF) -- 12/5/07 Testimony
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/88xx/doc8876/12-05-HBCMacroTestimony.pdf

Northern Trust – 11/07 Economic Forecast (16p PDF)
http://web-xp2a-pws.ntrs.com/content//media/attachment/data/econ_research/0711/document/us1107.pdf

UCLA Anderson Forecast: “Near-Recession Experience" (release date: 9/12/07) -- this is highlights of the report.
http://www.uclaforecast.com/contents/archive/media_9_07_1.asp

05 Dec, 2007

McGraw-Hill Construction Outlook ’08 (32p PDF) -- cost: $495
http://construction.ecnext.com/coms2/summary_0249-257482_ITM_analytics

. . . note, if you poke around www.construction.com, you can probably find a web reply of the Outlook '08 conference.

ULI/PricewaterhouseCoopers Report on ’08 Real Estate

Info from PricewaterhouseCoopers
http://www.pwc.com/extweb/ncpressrelease.nsf/docid/D1F044D6D36D8FD585257377005669A7

A Not-So-Great 2008 (summary of report from National Real Estate Investor)
http://nreionline.com/industrynews/emerging_trends_report/

Blog Entry on the ULI/PwC report
http://lansner.freedomblogging.com/2007/12/04/outlook-dimmer-for-commercial-real-estate-in-2008-forecast-says/

Order from ULI Bookstore ($62.95)
http://www.uli.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Bookstore&Template=/eCommerce/EcomDefault.cfm

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05 Dec, 2007

I elected to post a bunch of links here to construction and economic data. I'm doing it in pieces. Here's the first piece:

October Construction Spending Release from Census Bureau (see table 2, page 3, for not-seasonally adjusted year-to-date figures)
http://www.census.gov/const/C30/release.pdf

October Data from McGraw-Hill Construction (see table at bottom of web page for unadjusted Jan-0ct. figures)
http://www.construction.com/ResourceCenter/forecast/2007/Nov.asp

Handouts From NAHB Construction Forecast Conference (a number of downloaded from the late-October event)
http://www.nahb.org/generic.aspx?genericContentID=31952

November Reading Of Architecture Billings Index (11/21)
http://www.aia.org/press2_template.cfm?pagename=release_112107_abi

Detailed Report on October ABI
http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek07/1116/1116b_otb.cfm

AIA’s Baker: National Credit Problems Spill Over Into Nonresidential Sector
http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek07/0921/0921b_otb.cfm

05 Dec, 2007

Looking around at other blogs this morning, I stumbled across a game for kids (and maybe older people -- My Sustainable House.

First, it's a neat idea. Check it out!

Second, it brought me back (once again) to my days on Waste Age magazine, 1984-89. While there, I hired a guy named Tom Naber. Tom is now the President of the National Association of Electrical Distributors, but in our days together at Waste Age, he got to start a quarterly magazine (Waste Alternatives) -- and invented, with the help of a creative artist, a character for kids called Walt Waste Not.

I'm not going to say "those were the days." However, I had a very high opinion of Walt!

05 Dec, 2007

The Natl. Assn. of Electrical Distributors has created a new series of audio CDs under the title, "The Profitable Project" -- aimed specifically at electrical contractors. Each audio session tackles a specific business management topic from an electrical contractor's point-of-view.

First, note that the series has a host -- Joe Salimando, proprietor of The EleBlog. So this isn't a disinterested item!

Second, a quick story: On an airplane returning from a recent NAED meeting, a distributor looked at me as we grabbed our bags to get off the plane and said -- "I hear your voice all of the time at my office." The reason: The distributor invites selected electrical contractors to come in and listen to the the first CD. I had mixed emotions on hearing this. OF COURSE, I was happy that someone was putting "The Profitable Project" to a creative use. On the other hand, I felt sorry for anyone who has to listen to my voice more than once.

Third, where to find info on this online -- an NAED release.

05 Dec, 2007

Modern Distribution Management is hosting a webinar tomorrow (12/6) featuring Adam Fein's forecast for wholesale distribution in '08. I plan to listen in. I've written previously here about Adam's fine qualities.

Disclaimer: This isn't a paid ad. But there's so much involved here that I can't say I'm not influenced. I'm a big fan of Adam Fein. I'm also a big fan of Tom Gale, who runs MDM. I honestly think you should listen in to the Fein webinar!

05 Dec, 2007

I've noticed lately the raging of Common Sense in much of what's being discussed (at least) in the U.S.

Most obviously, there is the ongoing discussion of whether or not the U.S. government should bail out all of the people who did stupid things in the 2002-06 period in terms of buying houses, financing houses, packaging mortgages, and so forth. There are people who bit at 2/28 ARMs when they could have opted for 30-year mortgages; there are people who bought 3,200-sq.-ft. houses, when they could (and perhaps should) have gone for the 2,200-sq.-ft. versions.
Various and sundry people on the left and right are proposing a number of ways to help and bail out these people. Yet I am talking with people on the phone who agree with me (i.e., I could have done these things, I didn't, why should I have to pay -- via my government -- to bail out the morons?). In the past week, CNBC-TV raised this very issue and endured a firestorm of anger (from people like me) on a blog.

Other Common Sense stuff involves things like waste. I was reviewing an article about waste in an Asian city last night. It talked about how the city had been cleaned up with, among other things, a per-bag disposal fee. I can remember writing (and editing) articles about per-bag disposal fees in the 1980s, when I was Editor of Waste Age magazine. There's a huge amount of Common Sense in asking people to pay for how much garbage they dispose (I guess you'd have to make exceptions for those with big families -- like The Brady Bunch, or something).
With per-bag disposal, you pay only for the trash you create. This encourages: (a) recycling; (b) avoidance of waste; (c) creativity.

Along similar lines, I just read a short piece on FacilitiesNet -- "linking design and maintenance." Some of what's in there is so OBVIOUS, the reaction I had was . . . "no kidding?" But it's another sign of the return of Common Sense (maybe?).

I'm not declaring the Victory of Common Sense -- for one thing, I don't believe it's going to happen. But it's encouraging to see it wage a counterattack, after so many years in which it's been . . . absent.

05 Dec, 2007

Commerce Dept. released October construction spending #s on Friday 11/30. As usual, I look at Table 2 -- "value of construction put in place . . . NOT seasonally adjusted."

Overall: - 2.8% (at $977 billion). Throw in another 5 percentage points (or so) for inflation (the EleBlog take on inflation, anyway) -- and the down figure is closer to 8%.

Residential: -17.6%, at $451.6B vs $548B at this time one year ago.

Nonresidential: +17.3%. That percentage figure seems to "offset" the residential downer, but at nearly $286B, nonres is just not as big as res.

Public construction: + 12.0%. This helps keep the negative number reasonable. The biggest gross figures in Public (which totaled $239B thru Oct.) are

• Educational construction, at $68.4B (up 13.3%)
• Highway + Street, at $64.5B (up 5.5%)

Bottom line: This report looks very much like previous monthly reports.

03 Dec, 2007

Frank Bisbee, who I am proud to call a friend of mine, posts detailed information about the datacom/telecom industry each month at Wireville.com. He calls it Heard On The Street.

I think it's worth reading. He just e-mailed me a draft of the December edition, and it's 47,600 words. The November edition weighed in at more than 42,000 words -- obviously, the universe is, indeed, expanding.

It's definitely worth looking at! You might find yourself skimming to get through the thing, tho.

03 Dec, 2007

John Grau, the CEO of NECA, is a unique guy. First, he's been in his job for more than 20 years. Second, as the top staffer of an association of union electrical contractors, he's got a special perspective -- one that everyone (i.e., the non-union folks) might not appreciate.

I used to work for John; he hired me in 1990 to come back to NECA as Publisher of Electrical Contractor. So here's a disclaimer: I'm not going to be totally unbiased in dealing with either NECA or John!

I subscribe to the weekly reminder e-mail that tells me when John has posted to his blog, NECA Transmissions. I recommend that.

But more relevant here, I recommend the last four posts -- items 1-2-3-4 of "a brief history of construction (time)" -- in which John details, in a personal and (I think) accurate take, what's gone on in the recent history of the union/union contractor relationship with construction owner groups. Specifically, he talks about the Business Roundtable and the Construction Users Roundtable (CURT).

CLICK HERE to see the last post (#4) in the series. If you'd rather start at the beginning, links to parts 1, 2, and 3 are at the top of his post.