Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Earthship retrofitting: "The most versatile/economical building design"



http://earthship.com/retrofit/Retrofit-with-Earthship-Biotecture





I did an internship at Earthship Headquarters Taos, NM in March of this year. It was a great time and I learned so much about economical building. Earthships are designed to be off the grid. Each one is a piece of art. We are planning to build at least one on our property. Currently we are retrofitting the earthberm house that came with our farm.

This weekend (July 8, 9, 10) we are digging out the house, adding plastic for water protection (rain seeps in some of the rooms right now) and pounding earth into tires around the house. After the tires are finished we will add a row of insulation behind the tires for a thermal wrap and berm it all back up. This is going to be a lot of work! We would love it if you would come help and learn--or just come keep up company.

I am excited to see what this yields, especially in the winter. We will hopefully have some extra South facing windows by then to catch us some winter heat.

Pictures:
1. A solar array at the Lonetree work site in Taos. The array was used to power the tools for building. Later it went up on roof to provide power for the home.

2. Tires: an Earthship tire wall in Taos. Eventually this wall (internal) got covered in adobe. The external walls were bermed in with earth.

3. Me happy to be building in Taos.


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