People are staying home these days to avoid the spread of Covid-19, and unfortunately this means that many of the wonderful workshops that have been offered for learning about natural building and sustainable living have been cancelled. This is a loss for both the folks who organized and promoted the workshops and all the potential attendees who will not be getting hands-on experience, which often the best way to learn something.
I have had to cancel the workshop on earthbag building that I was going to teach in Colorado this summer because there are just too many uncertainties regarding the state of the world at that time. I maintain a list of upcoming workshops at greenhomebuilding.com and I am sure that many of these will also be canceled.
Now that so many of you are confined to your home much of the time, this could be a perfect opportunity to learn some skills via online courses. I did a bit of research and found a number of such online possibilities, and I’ll list those below.
www.solarenergy.org lists over a dozen online courses related to solar electric and thermal energy installation. Solar Energy International has been the premier source for education about these technologies for nearly three decades.
www.calearth.org has 7 courses related to Superadobe (earthbag) construction currently listed that are available online; in fact they are offering a 40% discount right now!
www.lowimpact.org has eight online courses, including topics such as compost toilets, solar electricity and strawbale building.
www.bioveda.co offers online permaculture in action training where you will learn how to build a passive solar home that will harvest rain and snow and store it in affordable water reservoirs, then purify it with a bio-char filter and recycle waste water and produce bio-gas. This entire course is now on sale for $99.
www.earthenhand.com This course allows you to study home made Earthen Paints which have been used for thousands of years to beautify human dwellings, and can produce a wide variety of colors and textures. They are non-toxic, ecological, and inexpensive to make.
www.yestermorrow.org This online class provides a general survey of the different methods available for creating a green, custom prefabricated home. Through a combination of weekly interactive video discussions and a guided design process utilizing SketchUp software, participants will prototype a factory-friendly design and strategy to maximize this affordable green architecture.
So now you can still learn all of this without leaving your home!
in addition to solar projects, there are many other types on Build It Solar:
More than 500 projects:
https://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Projects.htm
Free plans and information on: Conservation, water, solar homes, solar space heating, solar water heating, passive cooling techniques, solar sunspaces and greenhouses, solar pool heating, solar electricity (PV), wind generated electricity, micro hydro, biofuels, methane generators, solar cooking, solar food drying, solar and efficient vehicles, solar water pumping, solar engines, and solar wood drying.
https://www.builditsolar.com/
this website has been online for many years. hundreds of projects from hundreds of folks around the world.
Quotes from the website:
Plans, tools and information to help you build
renewable energy and conservation projects. solar shed solar space heating
Hundreds of projects — from changing a light bulb to building a solar homes.
Design information and tools for building renewable energy projects.
An Experimental section for backyard inventors.
Nothing For Sale here — just free ideas, plans, and information.
Questions? Comments? Ideas?
If you have any questions on solar or renewable energy projects, or suggestions to make the site better, or have an energy related idea, or have a project you have done or seen elsewhere — lets hear about it…
Thank you for doing the internet search for us, Kelly, to get us started in our own searches.