Earthship Buildings: Working in Harmony

This is a possible future. An Earthship is a radically sustainable green building made with recycled materials. This work is about learning to work in harmony to be self sufficient and to minimise the ecological footprint, so that children have a future that is safe, healthy and grounded in community.

I was sent some DVD’s on environmental issues today by a friend in Melbourne. She has worked on earthship projects. She loved the concept but she did find in her group politics seems to emerge. particularly when people have different mindsets, one of the gentlemen in her group was an accountant and she said he wanted to control the group, the group fell apart. It was an interesting experience for her. I think the challenge is people learning how to work in harmony, this is the key, and for the greater good. We often find ourselves in the challenge of self interest versus best interest.

The film I saw tonight was called Garbage Warrior. I have to say I was so inspired by Michael Reynolds the Architect in New Mexico, USA who was the original designer of earthships. Sounds like an idea that might take off.

Well they are not flying they are grounded in building designs that use recycled materials such as cans, tyres, mud and waste products to build a sustainable self sufficient home. Michael and his team can build a home in 14 days, they did this in India after a Tsunami and they made the homes in a dome shape so that if the water hits it disperses around the building, the points of least resistance. The building is also able to catch water (monsoon rain storage) and food gardens can be created around the house. The people were so surprised that the mud was able to stick and the structure was built to equalise temperature on the inside. Really intelligent design.

This man is an extraordinary visionary. According to his wife he lies awake thinking about the future, he is driven, as all visionaries are. He is his own person, does things his own way and loves building, he stated that he has experienced the freedom of complete sustainability. He comments it was the most wonderful feeling to not have to pay for anything but live off the land. His story goes back 40 or more years when he first came out of his architectural degree, he started to immediately design buildings so that they were able to catch water, were insulated no heating or cooling required (imagine no electricity bill) and no requirement for sewerage and he designed gardens that were edible, so he could survive. He did this not to save money, he saw a future where it was necessary to live self sufficiently. He described his vision of where humanity is heading, he described it as a herd heading for a cliff. His interests were selfish in the sense he had no desire to go over the cliff. He said if we go that way I die too. So he said he sees himself as a person who wants to divert the herd from the cliff.

He himself started building his own earthship, and as people heard about it they came to him and offered to help. He also found a guy crying on the street, he took him under his wing, and he worked along side him. I thought great for youth to get involved in positive projects, to feel useful rather than lost. For the cost of an expensive dinner they were able to get a plot of land and build their own earthships on the land he had. He said he believed all their money should go into their homes. So profit was not his motive, he is a leader but his vision is so that we all survive in the future. Very selfless as his story outlines and he just is in constant service to help others. He ended up with a community of people who worked with each other for 20 years or more.

He describes as this grew in popularity that he was receiving requests from around the world to build these cheap, sustainable homes out of garbage. He said his own father would not throw out anything, he said to him that it is too good to throw away. What a shift from the mentality we are all raised with, no thought about throwing stuff away. We just do it. Yet everything we do has an impact. As this project grew and more people wanted to live this way, perhaps the desire for freedom, he then faced opposition. He had disputes with the local Council and State Government, he was shocked to see them carrying guns and he was stopped from building his homes freely and creatively. The authorities said he broke every planning regulation in the book and they fought him. He had legal cases as there were some complaints about the houses, he called the houses experimental, and in the end the authorities revoked his Architectural licence. He then decided to completely comply with the laws and by-laws and spent years doing it the official way. He said his creativity completely disappeared and the freedom of being off the grid and living freely, dissipated. However, he complied with building codes, built roads, put in sewerage and built the same standard houses. His community was depressed for quite a few years.

He then took his team to other parts of the world and started to build earthships in tsunami affected places where he found in the wake of disasters people were more open to creative ideas and there was no red tape. They wanted solutions. He said for example in India his ideas were taken up immediately, they took 14 days to build a house, it would have taken 3 years in the US or more. As the complexity and challenges were faced from professionals and those in authority such as lawyers, policy makers, bureaucrats, largely concerned the mindsets, they couldn’t understand the concept and they had such a focus on money and laws they were unable to allow legislation to undertake test communities in sustainable design. Michael pointed out the contrast with Nuclear testing which he regarded as high risk and the money invested in the military but a program designed to help people live sustainably and become self sufficient was not viewed as important. So he had the challenge of changing very different mindsets to his. This is the essence to the barriers we face. Communiating the idea of ‘best interest’ and the incredible joy of service to others. This is the true reason for government, to serve people, but that feeling has been lost through processes of control. It is easy to see why these have emerged, however, we have to think differently now so increasingly the older ideas will be challenged and people will start to make changes with survival in mind.

He saw future cities collapse and was well ahead of his time. New Orleans was mentioned in respect of Hurricane Katrina and the inability of authorities to respond and the vulnerability of dependent people on systems of larger economies of scale. He noticed the politicians he dealt with whilst trying to get a bill through for allowing test sustainable communites. He noticed them engaged in agendas, politics and a range of other reasons why legislation was blocked or not supported to enable sustainable housing. It was as much about understanding the language of policy makers as it was about the reality facing people in the future. It was interesting to notice the building that housed the Senate was round, I surmised that it was going in circles, probably mirrored the reality in an ironic way. He tried twice to pass legislation for test communities and then walked away. It revealed how hard it is to initiate change, one can see the fixed nature of the mind sets and structures that hold the society in place. The vested interests such as energy companies, councils and governments in keeping standards uniform and not allowing in new ideas. Perhaps this is the explanation why the world is not changing. He was saying he saw the urgency of it. I also feel that. I have described in my poetry it is like heading to the cliff. There is a wise saying from Lao Tzu (Chinese Philosopher, 700BC) who stated it is the responsibility of those who see to tell the blind horseman on the blind horse that they are heading towards the abyss.

When do we hear and take responsibility, I guess it is when we have to.

Michael ended up taking his team to countries where there was need for this type of building and it became very popular around the world. So I guess the heartening part here, is it is not impossible and when you really are working for the big picture, you do what you can.

What I liked about this film was that he didn’t fight the authorities for years he complied with them, so he was able to observe the process and the barriers human beings face with change. One of the political advisers explained to him that in the US people were so terrified of change, that was why Bush was voted in. She said you can’t appear as a hippy or a person talking about climate change, they can’t handle it, they are afraid and they become paralysed, they can’t do anything. They avoid looking at the problem and don’t even go near solutions. So the seisure was the political system and a culture of fear. He filmed this experience and didn’t resist the authorities but did go and offer assistance to others. His wife said he is a single focussed person and just is very clear about where he is going. He noted that architects in mainstream architecture were unable to lead people in the direction to where they need to go. He pointed out they don’t build for people or around their needs. I would guess the profit motive moves them away and standard building codes ensure conformity with no-one thinking about how to build to live self sufficiently. There is no problem with seeking safety but overall if people are connected to electricity and water and there is a natural disaster, then what? How do people cope? They have no idea how to survive outside the system, this is the reality. These are real questions and perhaps people will be more open today given the disaster in Japan and earthquakes around the world. Emergency services and the extraordinary costs of disasters have to be faced. Nature of course makes its own changes.

Here is some information about a possible future, if we choose to prepare before nature forces us. As Michael stated, it may be too late by then. So we do have to make decisions today for the children of the world.

Earthship Biotecture http://www.earthship.org/

An Earthship is a radically sustainable building made of recycled materials.

An Earthship is defined by the following 6 principles:

– Thermal/Solar Heating & Cooling
– Solar & Wind Electricity
– Contained Sewage Treatment
– Built with Natural & Recycled Materials
– Water Harvesting
– Food Production

An Earthship is a new kind of building, a new kind of architecture. It is so new, we call it Biotecture. But we have been doing this for 40 years. An Earthship is a building that will take care of you, while still being sustainable, affordable, strong and logical.

Earthship Biotecture is a design/construction company in Taos, NM, USA. We travel the world building Earthships as well as here in America. Join us at the Earthship World Headquarters… stay a while, build with us. How many Earthships can we build together?
Call us at 575-751-0462 or send an email to reception@earthship.com.

Earthships come with all of their own utilities made on site with no utilitiy bills.

An earthship uses little to no fossil fuels to provide for modern amenities. We are simply adapting our needs to the already existing activities of the planet.

Water
Earthships catch water from the sky (rain & snow melt) and uses it four times.

Electricity
Earthships produce their own electricity with a prepackaged photovoltaic / wind power system. This energy is stored in batteries and supplied to your electrical outlets.

Sewage
Earthships contain, use and reuse all household sewage (greywater and blackwater) in indoor and outdoor treatment cells. Toilets flush with treated greywater.

Comfort
Earthships maintain comfortable temperatures in any climate.

Food
An environment in which plants are not only asthetic and contributing to the heath of our environment, but are also highly functional and play a direct role in the maintenance of the home.

– Reduce and even eliminate your utility bills.
– Get ALL of your electricity from the sun and the wind.
– Catch water from the sky for drinking, bathing, cleaning, showering, washing, flushing, etc.
– Contain and treat ALL of the sewage you produce in a healthy and beautiful way.
– Maintain comfortable temperatures in your building ALL year long, in any climate. Reduce or even eliminate your heating and cooling bills.

We must realize that we, the users of the vessel (the home), are part of the vessel. This is much the same as we, the users of the Earth, are part of the earth. The Earthship is a participant in the prevailing systems of planet earth. It causes no conflict, no stress, no depletion, no trauma to the planet earth.

Just as the human body is a result of the various systems that support it – (circulatory systems, nervous systems, respiratory systems, etc…) so must the Earthship be a product of the systems that support it. In view of this, we have made the Earthship systems both understandable and available to the common everyday human.

Systems are generally 25 percent of the construction cost of a home, providing little to no utility bills every month.

A Tree and its Systems

We are simply adapting our needs to the already existing activities of the planet.

Why pipe water long distances from a centralized community water system, or from an expensive well that needs significant electrical power, depletes aquifers and lowers the water table, when water fall from the sky?

Why have a corporate or political “middle man” between us and our energy needs? our vessel (home) must be designed to sail with the forces that exist beyond human control and exploitation.

An understanding of mechanical systems for most humans is limited to what is within reach of their fingertips. It is understood that when you flip a switch on the wall, a light comes on. when you turn on the faucet, hot water comes out. When you pull the handle on the toilet, it flushes. Little though is given to where the electricity comes from or what kind of nuclear waste was produced to generate it. how many of us even know where the power plant is that supplies our power. Few people ever wonder which water table is depleted to bring them water and what chemicals have been added to it. Where does the sewage go after it is flushed and which rivers and lakes are polluted by it?

Earthship Systems Plan

Humans need comfortable temperatures, light, electricity, hot water, food, sewage treatment, etc. These necessities are all available within the framework of a certain “rhythm” in the Earthship. The more we are able to align our priorities and needs with the prevailing rhythms of the planet, the easier and less expensive (both in terms of economics and ecology) they will be to obtain.

If our lifestyles can conform more to the patterns of the planet than to our socioeconomic system, we can reduce the stress on both ourselves and the planet. This is easier said than done due to the “reality” and the “gravity” of mortgage payments, utility bills and the generally high cost of eating and living. Most of us have no choice. We have to be places at certain times looking certain ways in order to make the money needed to make those payments. However, many people have built Earthships themselves and ended up with little to no mortgage payment. They also have little or no utility bills and their ability to grow food year-round inside the Earthship has greatly affected what they have to spend on packaged, processed foods.

The condition of our planet tells us we must now begin to take responsibility for what happens beyond the reach of our fingertips. We must begin to reconsider the source of these utilities, our access to them, and how we dispose of the waste produced. The mechanical systems of the Earthship confront these issues directly. We call this direct living. Source, access and destination are all contained within the Earthship, within the reach of our fingertips. There is no mystery involved in Earthship electricity. There is no unknown source of water. There is no magical black hole that sucks up all our sewage. Instead, we work in harmony with the earth to deal with these issues – taking what it has to give us directly and giving back what it wants to receive. With this harmony ringing in our minds we evolve the Earthship Systems.