Test description: Shear strength of plastered 4′ x 4’/ 1.2 x 1.2 m bag wall (15″ / 38 cm thick) of weak cohesive soil with barbed wire; Materials: solid poly bags, tamped subsoils of silt and clay, lime and earthen plaster Abstract: Earthbag is a growing sustainable building technique that is increasingly desired in the … Read more
Many of our readers are dreaming of building a small, efficient, sustainable home that requires some sort of heating. A wood-fired cookstove is a good multi-functional option for heating, cooking and water heating. You may be able to save money by buying a smaller cookstove. Or consider a used stove of good quality because they … Read more
I want to encourage people to put a lot of time and effort into developing an effective building plan, and I think Cliff’s approach, described below in his words, is the right one. We’ve had an ongoing email discussion for months. Numerous ideas from discussions with Cliff and others have found their way into this … Read more
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCZnG5lGNS8&feature=related Most earthbag builders buy low cost subsoil and have it trucked to the building site. There are lots of advantages to buying soil, including having the soil dumped right where you need to save labor and speed construction. But what if you can’t get low cost subsoil or other suitable fill material? For instance, … Read more
A reader’s question the other day reminded me that we haven’t posted much on rainwater harvesting. This is a very important topic that will likely become even more pressing in the future as groundwater sources dwindle and become polluted, are taken over by big corporations and as population increases. Rainwater harvesting includes roofwater capture and … Read more
Here’s another great project. This small domicile demonstrates how scoria homes are faster and easier to build than bags filled with soil, and more insulating. This doesn’t mean standard soil-filled earthbags are obsolete. There are pros and cons to each system, however, I strongly encourage using scoria bags (or pumice or other suitable lightweight fill … Read more