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
This plan illustrates what I think is the simplest, easiest way to build an earthbag home: build in stages, one roundhouse at a time so you can pay with cash and move in right away. It’s far easier to start small and add on later than jump right into building a large home that could … Read more
Kelly just created a new page on this blog that anyone can access from the top menu. It simply says “Bulletin Board” and the text on the page reads: “This is an opportunity for visitors to post their own bulletin board announcements on the Earthbag Building Blog. The way to do this is simply to … Read more