The materials cost break down is as follows: Plastic: $281.00 Wood: $434.00 PVC Elbows: $66.00 (SHOP AROUND!) Screws,Connectors, bolts, strapping: $50 1 1/4 pipe and part of the side wall pipes:$ 35.00 Plastic for endwalls: $31.00 ( I would make them solid next time) 20 foot 1 inch PVC from craigslist 45 sticks $100.00 Replacement PVC due to breakage: $ 54.00 To explain the breaks, When I got the pipe, I didn't notice some of it was thinwall and not Schedule 40. I thought I could get by with it. It works fine for the side pipes, but not the ribs. There is some of it still being used, It is just between some Schedule 40 pipe. The thin wall stuff broke in the 50-70 mph winds we had for several days. It was easy to replace. I copied this off the pile of receipt I have sitting here. My grand total was $997. After the storms it went up to $1,051. If you had to my the pipe new, for me it would have raised it to $1,297. Of course I am not counting my tools, electricity and the food and beverages I had to pay for to get my friends and family out to pull the plastic over, twice! I also built it much stronger than others may. If you live in a protected area, you could get by cheaper. However here, it isn't an option. Thanks for asking, if you would like any more info let me know. Jay Jay

By having no electricity or gas I assume you mean you cant hook up to them but could produce them onsite. Green design is a great goal but can be taken to extremes that are frankly silly. Green can mean many things. Use of passive solar design such as larger over hangs on roofs,( orientation) southern facing windows,insulations such as recycled paper( blown in cellulose),masonry trumball( sp??)walls/floors...think walls that absorb heat in day and release it at night as an efficient wood burning( renewable green tree)fireplace. Consider LED lights that reduce electric needs and last longer and reduce the number of solar panels needed. But it may also mean not buying green products made in China but any product green or not thats made locally and doesnt require shipping halfway around the globe. It might mean not wasting time, light and energy on filling out worthless REScheck reports for beuracracies that simply show a house meets a milestone that rarely fails if minimum standards are met. It might mean building out of scrap or recycled building products from habitat for inhumanity ( we are all evil planet destroyers afterall) You could also not put in a shower that wastes water since we dont need them because you could stand in the rain. It might mean you recycle gray water( sinks and showers) into filters and then landscape beds. Consider solar water heaters. Consider very costly wind generators that have 10-15 year payback that are hard for anyone to afford upfront that dont provide all you electric needs anyway.Consider whole house fans that help reduce cooling costs. Consider materials such as OSB, and Engineered I joists that use scrap lumber most effectively and dont require the larger old growth trees but can be sustainably grown and harvested.. you know...green. Design a house that reduces waste that gets sent to landfill. Go out and pick up scraps of wood and burn them in the fireplace that heats your water or house( nature burns wood too you know...ie lightning started forest fires) Use energy star /efficient appliances( made and shipped from China /Korea to save energy and use fewer solar panels. Stock up on candles for times when you dont have sun and wind and dont want to use a ton of batteries that will eventually fail and took energy to make and cost someone alot to safely dispose of when it does fail. Dont use mercury filled compact flourescent bulbs (another beaurocratic nightmare (IMHO) Avoid using vegitable oils and other food wasting / price increasing ethanol like technology shoved down your throat by enviriomental weinies thinking they know whats best for you.Use common sense... Dont build, live or travel like Al Gore the biggest lying sack of crap on the green planet. put video phones in and never leave your house for all those green seminars all over the planet when you could just broadcast yourself over the internet you invented so that you can get paid tons of money just to declare your green , we're all gonna die if we dont listen to you, you know whats best after all... debate is over and reject any and all those silly scientists who debunk your political science. They know nothing.. you were VP after all !!! The point is that green ( makes me sick to hear it anymore) is a great goal but being told what we can build, how we have to build, how big we can build and what materials we have to build with means nothing if you lose your freedom to choose and freedom to live your life as you see fit. Keep in mind most of these technologies are quite expensive to include, are not fully dependable and reliable, require tax credits and rebates ( think your neighbor paying for your green house) to even come close to being able to pay off. Then consider the time, energy; yes energy, to research the new technology, or to get through the nightmare of red tape and paperwork to follow through to get those tax credits and grants you didnt pay for to build your home. Then consider that many green products have unintended consequences like higher food prices or higher costs to make, to ship from halfway around the world, like shorter lifespans and toxic wastes that need to be treated to be disposed of( ie batteries and mercury tainted lights) and the energy used to run a computer to research the endless redtape needed to get that tax break or find a reliable green product that does what it claims to do or be. Many electric /hybrid cars take more energy to build,ship,and dispose of than cars not considered green. The best reason to go green is because it means you save money and it works well because the fact you save the planet is more often than not.... likely to be a false presumption. Dont be afraid to point this out to the teacher who probably is a liberal natzi ( no offense to the liberal natzi's...I just dont like your misguided ideas) who wouldnt know green if it grew naturally in front of them only for them to tell you its harmful to use what nature produces. Their was a study done recently that basically shows we are very unlikey to ever produce enough solar panels or wind generators to meet our needs because they take so much room its crazy to think we can run all our cars and house on electric without nuclear or some other new technology that will make many of those so called green technologies obsolete. Then we will have to dispose of them. It will most likely for some time to come be a variety of methods to provide for our needs.Technology I have read about that offer promise are solar concentrating cells, higher efficient solar panels,thin film ( less efficient less $$$) panels, Hydrogen conversion onsite that produce electric, Fuel cell generators of various types, Vertical axis wind generators,solar collecting coated building products, waste to oil technology( converting slaughter house, medical,used tire waste etc into biodiesel fuel, natural gas and fertizers)( see http://www.changingworldtech.com/). I am sure I have forgotten or excluded many products and methods of being / building green but this might give you some ideas and food for thought. Dont forget to challenge the popularly held beliefs and misconceptions that are out there at the same time. If that isnt enough just forget the house bring in a model of a car tell them you are going to live in it, shower at or with you neighbor or just dont shower. You will only eat berries and plants no meat that came from a fart emitting cow or chicken or pig. You will only power your electric car with solar panels and will never leave you house/car unless you really need to to minimize your carbon footprint( uggggh this really makes me vomit)and will mindlessly play Al Gores videos and tapes over and over and never question why he will never shut his co2 emitting trap long enough to debate anyone with a fact in hand or ask him why evey time he shows up it turns out to be the coldest day on record in the global warming world ..Ooops sorry man made climate change time in our life. Good luck on your house and dont forget to stick it to a know it all, do gooder enviromental natzi every so often just to fluster them and make them think a bit too. Now back to the drawing boards( a green one )!

As others have pointed out, this is the sort of question that it really depends on who you ask. The answer has caused more than a little friction in my house, that's for sure. We're GCing ourselves, with my father-in-law acting as a co-GC, because he's been in construction since The Dawn Of Time (TM) and knows who to call for stuff. He also does outstanding concrete flatwork. *My* dad is the architect. My brother-in-law is the electrician. So far, so good. We broke ground August 19 of last year, as I recall. Our foundation was poured one year ago today (I remember because my son and I wrote the date in the wet concrete). We were dried in by the end of October. Then came a rather cold, rather snowy Nebraska winter, which has a way of slowing things down. As of today, we're still a couple weeks out - by the time it's all done, we'll be 13 months start to finish. What's slowed us down, besides weather (that cold winter was followed by a very wet spring) has been things like waiting 2.5 weeks for the framer that we (read: my FIL) wanted; having a stick-framed instead of trussed roof; and having to be at the bottom of most of our subs' list, as a lot of them work for builders who get first call on their to-do lists (trim carpentry was a big problem - it took about 2 months to get that done). The best part has been that people - chief among them my mother-in-law - have been riding our butts about how long it's taken, completely ignoring that: 1)We're doing a LOT of stuff ourselves; and 2)The schedule that she thinks homes should be completed is that of a production builder - 6-7 months. Oh, and we've been *living* with the in-laws since June 1 - I did a bit too good a job of marketing our old house and managed to sell it in nine days; even with a 45-day close, we still have spent the entire summer living w/ Grandma & Grandpa. I need a beer. Jason

If you have Windows XP, here's a nice, easy way to resize photos. Download and install the XP Image Resizer Powertoy from Microsoft via the link below. Once installed, all you have to do is right-click on an image file (I know it handles jpg/gif files and it may handle others as well). You will now see an option to "Resize Pictures." Click on "Resize Pictures" and you will be given a menu that looks like this: Choose the option that you'd like and click OK. You can use the advanced button to enter a custom size. The tool will leave your original picture untouched. It simply creates another file named "imagename (small).jpg" or medium or large, etc. You can easily resize multiple pictures this way by selecting multiple items from your explorer window (using the CTRL or Shift key), right-clicking and selecting "Resize Pictures". It's a really nice little tool that most people don't know exists and it's much easier than doing the same thing via image editing software. And it's free. Feel free to ask questions if my instructions above are unclear. Here is a link that might be useful: Microsoft Windows XP Image Resizer Powertoy