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May 20, 2005
CBC to air Code Green
Jewish enviromental twist on home renovation TV.
PAT JOHNSON
Four families compete with each other to retrofit their homes with
energy-efficient appliances and other cost-saving efforts. The family
that saves the most is presented with a hybrid car. It's a new twist
on reality TV and the mania for home improvement shows. It's also
got a uniquely Jewish bent.
The producer, Daniel Leipnik, is known to local Jewish audiences
for his miniseries My Mother, My Hero, which explored the
parenting challenges faced by Holocaust survivors. He has also done
promotional programs for the Jewish Family Service Agency and the
Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver and is at work on another
series, The Mazel Tov Chronicles, which explores Jewish simchot.
Australian by birth (Leipnik's mother is Canadian) and educated
at the Jewish school Mount Scopus College in Melbourne, Leipnik
said his various projects – whether explicitly Jewish in content
or not – are deeply infused with his Jewishness.
"We were taught to be intellectuals and we were really pushed
to be the top of our fields," he said of his school in Australia.
His programs, he said, reflect the Jewish value of tikkun olam,
in that they seek to be "television that is a cut above the
rest."
The home improvement program, called Code Green, is the most
explicitly environmentalist of his numerous projects, but Leipnik
stressed that his "green" attitudes infuse his other work
as well. For a pilot episode of the Mazel Tov Chronicles,
Leipnik worked with Rabbi Ilan Acoca of Vancouver's Beth Hamidrash
Synagogue and the Jewish environmental group Adam va-Adamah to catch
on film the relatively new phenomenon of a Tu b'Shevat seder. The
program shows a group of observant Jews valuing nature and celebrating
creation and the traditional environmental holiday of Tu b'Shevat
in a new way.
In Code Green, which airs on CBC, the Jewish angle is rather
more discreet. Tikkun olam – repairing the world –
is done in incremental ways.
Behavioral changes and technical alterations resulted in changes
to the four homes that brought in savings as high as $5,000. Some
of the behavioral changes were as simple as hanging laundry, rather
than using a dryer, and switching to low-wattage light bulbs. Replacing
traditional fireplaces with forced air gas fireplaces reduced heating
costs. Energy-efficient new appliances replaced old energy hogs.
All of this cost money, of course. Each participating family was
given $15,000 for the project, though the energy savings would repay
that amount within about five years – not a long period relative
to the life of a home.
Leipnik and his crew had to sift through 1,000 applicants to choose
the four participating families. The ones chosen lived in houses
that were drafty, poorly insulated and contained appliances and
furnaces that weren't doing the environment or the owners any favors.
Unfortunately, said Leipnik, these sorts of energy pigs are not
at all uncommon.
"There are whole suburbs with houses like that," he said.
The two-part series airs on CBC in British Columbia, at 7 p.m.,
on two Thursdays, May 26 and June 2. Leipnik knows which family
won the hybrid car, but he's not talking.
Meanwhile, the environmental home reno phenomenon is spreading.
Leipnik and his colleagues, including Ric Beairsto (familiar to
Bulletin readers for last year's Superkids, a documentary
on gifted children), have franchises for a similar series in Atlantic
Canada, the Prairies, the United States and Australia. Leipnik is
also looking for community support for The Mazel Tov Chronicles,
which has gained the interest of Vision TV, but requires further
funding for completion.
More information about Leipnik's projects is available at www.vibrancealive.com.
Pat Johnson is a B.C. journalist and commentator.
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