“We are developing an ecovillage in the South Gulf Islands of British Columbia, Canada. The ecovillage is working to be a model of co-operative, sustainable land habitation and land use and features public outreach and education as included goals.
Canada
Affordable Lava Rock Insulation for the Far North
Porous lava rock — scoria (cinders) and pumice — is an ideal building material. We’ve covered this amazing material many times on our blog, but I just learned something very exciting. It turns out scoria is available in Alaska, British Columbia and to some extent the Yukon. All these areas have cinder cones (a type of volcano) that produce scoria. This is great news because porous lightweight lava rock is a good insulator and also fireproof, rot proof, easy to work with and doesn’t attract pests. It’s affordable if there’s a nearby source to minimize shipping costs. So this discovery makes it practical to build lightweight superinsulated earthbag houses in Alaska and Canada. Use the search engine on the right to search this site for details and example projects.
Video: Canadian Earthbag House
Here’s one of the bigger houses built using the earthbag method.
Update on Canadian Dirtbags Earthbag Home
“Well, the updates continue to be slow to come and sparse on detail but that’s because we are still working away. I had hoped we’d be in by now, with only floors and ceiling to complete before we could start moving stuff over. Who knew floors and ceiling would be so challenging in round(ish) rooms? We were going to go with a natural feel to the floors, a lime finish, but changed our minds at last minute. Partly for the convenience of cleaning and in part for the extra buffer from the cold we decided on a dark laminate flooring (I know, I know- not very ‘natural’ but gorgeous) and it turns out I suck at cutting laminate floor boards, much as I love the power tools.
The Evolution of a Canadian Earthbag Dome House
From Sierra in Canada: Here is my Youtube video on the earthbag structure I have been working on for the last 3 years. It is almost complete…just needs some windows and doors installed and some finishing touches inside and out. I thought you might be interested to see the progress.
Lutzs’ Floating Cabin
“Who here hasn’t thought about the pleasures of going off the grid — the concept of removing oneself from the trappings of modern society, Thoreau-like, in favor of something a little simpler?