More on “Autonomous Buildings”—future tech for free humans

“It is quite possible in all parts of Australia to construct a ‘house with no bills’, which would be comfortable without heating and cooling, which would make its own electricity, collect its own water and deal with its own waste… These houses can be built now, using off-the-shelf techniques. It is possible to build a “house with no bills” for the same price as a conventional house, but it would be (25%) smaller.”

Sound interesting?

“Imagine living outdoors indoors in a transparent dome, picking organically grown vegetables right in your kitchen, sleeping in a bed under luxuriant trees or slung beneath the opened apex, comfortable regardless of the weather outside. Your autonomous garden home is heated and cooled by the sun, which also provides electricity and hot water. Solar heat is stored in translucent water tanks that nurture edible fish and furnish nutrient rich irrigation water for the plants”

-----J. Baldwin. “The Garden of Eden” Buckyworks 1996

The New Alchemy Institute

From their Manifesto (of sorts):

“Among our major tasks is the creation of ecologically derived human support systems - renewable energy, agriculture aquaculture, housing and landscapes. The strategies we research emphasize a minimal reliance on fossil fuels and operate on a scale accessible to individuals, families and small groups. It is our belief that ecological and social transformations must take place at the lowest functional levels of society if humankind is to direct its course towards a greener, saner world.”

“Our programs are geared to produce not riches, but rich and stable lives, independent of world fashion and the vagaries of international economics. The New Alchemists work at the lowest functional level of society on the premise that society, like the planet itself, can be no healthier than the components of which it is constructed. The urgency of our efforts is based on our belief that the industrial societies which now dominate the world are in the process of destroying it.”

They walk the walk, too.  Their website is gorgeous, and chock full of their published work: intricate plans for bioshelters, numerous types of domes, hydroponics, fish farms....they have the goods, and they give the goods away.  Our kind of humans.

Also in 1976, this bioshelter was built for a bitterly cold, far-northern climate. It used multiple systems of solar storage - passive solar fish ponds, active solar hot water panels and hot water tanks, active hot air transfer to a rock matrix, and a back-up wood stove. This bioshelter is also residential, with a house and barn attached to the greenhouse. Designed and built by Solsearch Architects, PEI, Canada.

The Reality Sculptors

An interesting site with a great deal of red meat for the curious mammal.  (I especially enjoyed his article ”Re-forming vs. New-forming”.) A great deal of their project rely upon the very remarkable substance known as Aerogel.

Several really amazing things to note about aerogel are its incredibly light weight, incredible strength for such small mass, and its incredible insulating powers. Aerogel often weighs only 3-10 times as much as air. Its strength and insulating powers are probably best seen to be believed.

They also (and this is one hell of a resource to stumble across) have the entire, long-lost ”Whole Future Catalog” backed up online.

Furthermore and Beyond

I should probably mention OFF GRID DOT NET.  It’s a fairly solid resource, very up-to-date, but the pop-over ads reduce their ambitions to a pile of shit.  No love.

Much more to come, stay tooned.