Women’s Earthbag Dome Building Apprenticeship in Canada

This 10-week, hands-on Apprenticeship brings together a group of native St’at’imc community members with a team of women who are enthusiastic about living, learning, building and inspiring the empowerment of creative unity to build a Cultural Arts Centre near Lillooet, BC. Fox McBride and Chloe Wolsey, lead design-build specialists, plus guest instructors, WASI delegates, their assistants, and First Nations residents in the St’at’imc Territory will work together with apprentices to build a multifunctional space that embraces the culture and dynamic vision of the community.

Source: Kleiwerks International

Women’s Earthbag Dome Building Apprenticeship in Canada is a post from: Natural Building Blog

“Josef “Sepp” Holzer is a farmer, author, and an international consultant for natural agriculture. After an upbringing in a traditional Catholic rural family, he took over his parents’ mountain farm business in 1962 and pioneered the use of ecological farming, or permaculture, techniques at high altitudes (1100 to 1500 meters above sea level) after being unsuccessful with regular farming methods. Called the “rebel farmer” because he persisted in these practices despite being fined and even threatened with prison for practices such as not pruning his fruit trees (unpruned fruit trees survive snow loads that will break pruned trees). He has also created some of the worlds best examples of using ponds as reflectors to increase solar gain for Passive solar heating of structures, and of using the microclimate created by rock outcrops to effectively change the hardiness zone for nearby plants. He has also done original work in the use of Hugelkultur and natural branch development instead of pruning (see Fruit tree pruning) to allow fruit trees to survive high altitudes and harsh winters. He is currently conducting permaculture (“Holzer Permaculture”) seminars both at his Krameterhof farm and worldwide, while continuing to work on his alpine farm. His expanded farm now spans over 45 hectares of forest gardens, including 70 ponds, and is said to be the most consistent example of permaculture worldwide. In the past he was doing many experiments with different animals. As a result of this experiments, there is a huge role for animals in the Holzer Permaculture. For example, Holzer is using different kinds of pigs to dig new beds. This is a very effective way of digging, the only thing he has to do is to throw some maize and other fruits to the place he wants to dig. A couple of days later, he can push the pigs back to their enclosure and plant new plants in this beds. Holzer is able to crop his plants with a huge success, without using any fertilizer.

He is author of several books, works nationally as permaculture-activist in the established agricultural industry, and works internationally as adviser for ecological agriculture. He is the subject of the film The Agricultural Rebel directed by Bertram Verhaag.”

Source: Wiki
Sepp Holzer’s Permaculture
Sepp Holzer’s Permaculture book:
A Practical Guide to Small-Scale, Integrative Farming and Gardening

Sepp Holzer’s Permaculture System is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Pain’s compost power plant supplied 100 percent of Pain and his wife Ida’s rural household’s energy needs. A compost mound of tiny brushwood pieces (3 metres high and 6 across) was made of tree limbs and pulverized underbrush. Pain spent considerable attention developing prototypes of machines required to macerate small tree trunks and limbs; one of these, a tractor-driven model, was awarded fourth prize in the 1978 Grenoble Agricultural Fair. The 50 tonnes of compost was then mounded over a steel tank with a capacity of 4 cubic metres. This tank was 3/4 full of the same compost, which had first been steeped in water for 2 months. The hermetically sealed tank was connected by tubing to 24 truck tyre inner tubes, banked nearby for the methane gas to collect. The gas was distilled by being washed through small stones in water and compressed. Pain used the gas for cooking and producing electricity. He also fueled a truck. Pain estimated that 10 kilos of brushwood would supply the gas equivalent of a litre of petrol.

It took about 90 days to produce 500 cubic metres of gas – enough to keep two ovens and three burner stoves going for a year. The methane-fueled combustion engine drove a generator that produced 100W of electricity. This charged an accumulative battery which stored the current, providing all the light needed for the household. Some skepticism has been leveled at the quantities of methane Pain was able to extract from his system, and it is not known if anyone has been able to reproduce this quantity of the same system.

Hot water was generated through 200 metres of pipe buried inside the compost mound. The pipe was wrapped around the methane generator with an inlet for cold water and an outlet for hot. The heat from the decomposing mass produced 4 litres per minute of hot water heated to 60 degrees Celsius – enough to satisfy the central heating, bathroom and kitchen requirements.

The compost heap continued fermenting for nearly 18 months, after which time the installation is dismantled, with the humus being used to mulch soils, and a new compost system is set up at once to assure a continuous supply of hot water.”

Owen: Biomass is low tech, cheap, and environmentally friendly. One possibility is gaining access to forest thinnings like he did. The US Forest Service is always thinning the forests. The trick would be living near one of these areas to keep transport costs low. Another challenge is obtaining sufficient biomass year after year. Sometimes the forest in a particular area is cleared of small growth and then what? Also, you need adequate space to store the large piles that are about 10’ high. You’d have to figure out the details, get the timing right, live where this is feasible, have sufficient land, a chipper, time to devote to the project, etc. You’d also want a backup system such as a woodstove in case of any glitches or to smooth out the dips in temperature. The machinery could be shared or contracted out to supply compost piles for an entire community. The resulting compost would sustain large gardens. One option in cold climates is to cover an earth-sheltered home with one of these Jean Pain compost piles.

Source: Wiki
Permies.com
Mother Earth News
Humble Garden More great videos.
Special thanks to Cliff for finding another great sustainable living method.

Jean Pain’s Compost-based Bioenergy System is a post from: Natural Building Blog

This log end flooring photo has been ‘repinned’ hundreds of times at Pinterest.

Earthbag Building Blog pics at Pinterest (now Natural Building Blog)

Here are a few of Luke’s favorites at Pinterest:
Janet Mills http://pinterest.com/jhmills/home/ (Hobbit style)

http://pinterest.com/naturalhomes/ – This is the absolute best on facebook, I’m sure he’ll add more and more posts as time goes on. Oliver Swann has an incredible facebook page with nearly 60k likes now. (Last time we spoke about him, it was 10k)

http://pinterest.com/funksteena/ This is her main page, but here are the specific boards I like:

http://pinterest.com/funksteena/sea-container-houses-prefab/

http://pinterest.com/funksteena/earthships-and-hobbit-holes/

http://pinterest.com/balesa729/cob-works/ I like this board, she has a couple others but this is the best

http://pinterest.com/handyinhumboldt/natural-building/

http://pinterest.com/mitchscar/ – Just a guy with a lot of great ‘pins’ including natural building and lots of other great diy projects.

http://pinterest.com/gcunningham10/ – Lots of incredibly artistic and inspiring ideas, though likely not natural building, but natural building certainly could be implemented.

Natural Building Blog Pics at Pinterest is a post from: Natural Building Blog

If you are looking for new materials, a few phone calls to local stores can often result in significant savings. You can ask building suppliers to give you a quote for a package deal, and this frequently produces savings.

Another approach is to do some shopping online, at least to compare prices. Sometimes the larger suppliers have an online store where you can order products that are then shipped to your local store. There are some companies, such as tradekey.com where you can compare lots of of product sources, such as Aluminum Pipes, Aluminium Panels, and Galvanized Sheets.

Shopping for Building Materials is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Earthbag swimming pool

Source: Permies Forum

Earthbag Swimming Pool is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Source: Appropedia
Resilient Communities
Resilient Communities.org archives

Resilient Communities is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Nine free plans such as this Craftsman house are now available as PDFs

The free plans include: Economizer House plan, Solar Pit House plan, Craftsman Bamboo/Plastic Bottle House plan (Honorable Mention in the Shelters for All housing competition), and the Desert Shelters that I’ve been writing about lately. I’ve added links below each plan so you can preview them first if you want. As always, please document your projects and send us a summary with the best photos so we can publish the news on our blog.

Free House Plans and Desert Shelter Plans Now Available is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Adobe house

Natural building offers a way to construct a home with renewable, naturally occurring and locally available materials, as opposed to industrial or man-made products. Many of these materials are available throughout the world, so the costs and pollution associated with the transportation of these materials across the country falls. Using natural materials also reduce toxins in the home. As a bonus, many of these methods are energy efficient, inexpensive and easy to build with little construction knowledge. In this article, we’ll look at 10 natural building materials that are being used today.

1. Adobe
2. Cob
3. Earth-sheltered
4. Earthships
5. Earthbags
6. Rammed earth
7. Cordwood
8. Bamboo
9. Straw bales (plus loose straw)
10. Rock”

Read the entire article for free at the source: Curiosity.com
Image source: Getty Images

Top 10 Natural Building Materials is a post from: Natural Building Blog

Permaculture Videos
Hey Owen, I just thought you might find this collection of youtube videos interesting. They’re all permaculture links, with natural building how-to’s included. Permaculture Cairns
Luke

Redneck Rocket Stove

One report said this works almost as well as a store bought rocket stove.

More Natural Building and Permaculture Videos is a post from: Natural Building Blog