Earthship New Zealand

Earthship Biotecture have posted an interesting article on empirical evidence of an Earthship behaving in a fire.  Back in 1996 an incomplete Earthship was ravaged by a forest fire which levelled all the surrounding conventionally built homes.

There’s an interesting description as to what happened to the rammed earth tyre walls.  Check it out: Earthship Biotecture – An Earthship goes through the Hondo Fire!.

Ecobob.co.nz have written an interesting short article on recycled building material.  Of course no such article would be complete without reference to Earthships (and a plug for this website – thank you!!).

Another interesting part of the article mentioned work out of the University of Nottingham, where they are producing a ‘Bitublock’ out of recycled glass, metal slag, sewage sludge, incinerator ash, and pulverised fuel ash from power stations.

According to Dr Forth, this eco-friendly ‘Bitublock’ consists of up to 100 per cent recycled materials, and uses less energy to manufacture than a concrete block. It’s about six times as strong, which makes it a high-performance product. Dr Forth hopes the Bitublock will completely replace energy-intensive concrete as a structural material.

It sounds great but of course in the three R’s, “Reuse” comes before “Recycle” and its an advantage to be able to reuse a waste material without having to re-process it through another energy cycle.   This is where the reuse of waste tyres, bottles and shipping containers for building construction offer a clear advantage (not to mention preventing someone from intervening in the process by repackaging materials and making ‘green’ money out of it).

Check out the full article at: Rubbish good for building your house – Ecobob Forums .

Check out this Earthship which has been around since at least 1996.  You can see from the pictures that this Earthship is high up in the Rockies and exposed to high extremes of weather.  My favourite picture is where the snow is up to the windows!

Check out: Fun Climbs Around The World » Our Summit county earthship, over the years.

Many thanks to those who contacted us advising that the Forum wasn’t performing.  You’re right and we have taken it down until we can find a better solution for our needs.

This short film shows some of the alternative building materials and designs an Ohio couple have experiemented with on their farm over the last ten years.

For more information go to: http://www.bluerockstation.com/

Chris and Sandra are a couple living with their children in Darfield, British Colombia.

“We are a family of five living in Darfield, BC.

Our house is six hundred square feet in total and we are feeling cramped.

We have decided to build an earthship!

So starts the adventure …”

A great blog chronicling their Earthship adventure.  Also be sure to check out their house plans via their blog Building an Earthship in Darfield, BC.

Follow this link to check out Golden Bay Hideaway.

This is Lawrence McIntyre’s “Little Greenie” recently awarded the highest energy rating of any house in NZ.  Its fantastic to see a great array of local materials and products used, combined with the latest technology from Europe and afar.

Its a great run through of the build process – enjoy!

Rob

Annually $41 should provide heat and hot water to New Zealand’s highest-rated energy efficient home.

Add LED lights, extra insulation and a modest size, and total electricity bills should be about $20 a month.

Owner Lawrence McIntyre hopes people will visit the house, his “little greenie”, and see they could build one themselves.

“The difference between insulating a house the way I have and the way another house is, is probably only $3000 to $4000 and the insulation value is more than double,” he said.

High quality double-glazed windows stop heat escaping, along with wool insulation and a polystyrene break to stop the concrete floor touching the ground. Sun-warmed air is directed into the walls for storage and to release heat.

The Energy Rating Authority worked out it would cost less than $50 for hot water and to heat the house to about 20C all year. The need for heating was about 85 per cent lower than an average new house, and about 97 per cent lower than an uninsulated house.

Mr McIntyre said the extra features would more than pay for themselves over their lifetime. “Really we need to move away from this [idea we should have a] pay-back period of five or seven years because the health benefits [of warm houses] … are huge.”

For more information, go to goldenbayhideaway.co.nz and eeca.govt.nz

via ‘Little greenie’ runs heating on $41 a year – Life & Style – NZ Herald News.

There’s a new type of home being built near Miles City that will cost its owner nothing to heat or cool.

It’s called an Earthship and it’s a self sustaining home which provides heating and cooling, electricity, sewage treatment, water harvesting and food production. not to mention a zero utility bill.

“To me it makes sense; a building that will basically take care of you and itself,” said Demian Larsen, Earthship Builder. “I can leave and not worry about lines freezing or paying power bills.”

Earthships have been built all around the world, but this is the latest, an 1,800 square foot home located just a few miles outside Miles City.

Almost every part of an Earthship is eco-friendly, including the roof, which catches water and channels it through filters for consumption, cleaning and bathing.

Instead of wood and cement, the major building component of the earthship is low-priced automobile tires which are filled with dirt to create earth bricks.

Other ways this green house will save you some green is through solar panels that keep the inside at a cool 72 degrees.

“There’s a shallow indoor planter that will provide herbs, lettuces, small gardens and deeper cells for small fruit trees, bananas and avocados.”

While Earthships continue to help the environment and eliminate utility

via Earthship Home | KULR-8 TELEVISION – Billings, Montana | Local Top Stories.

The Pfalzers purchased a 10-acre lot in Myaka City to build an Earthship inspired by green builder Michael Reynolds. They first heard about the Earthship at a Johnny Carson show back in the 80’s, says Michael Pfalzer.

“We liked the self sufficiency and other features of the home, including getting water from the rain, not relying so much on electric to maintain the temperature,” he said. “We wanted to reduce our footprint on the Earth.”

They started to gather used tires in September 2006, says Denise Pflazer.

“The tire wall is part of the main design of the Earthship,” said Denise. “The Earthship is a rammed earth house and the used tires hold the compacted dirt in.”

Contractor Bryan Roberts said Florida is one of the top two states for difficulty and stringent building codes.

The Pfalzers’ wishes become a reality: their home is being built entirely from recycled materials. Their home would also be their business: the garden would provide food and they would pay nothing for utility bills.

Roberts promises a hurricane proof, self-sustainable, off-grid house without utilities connected to it. The price of the home is $300,000, which runs line in line with the price of a traditional frame home. He adds that the 3,000-square-foot house will not look like tire and glass when finished. At the end, they berm the walls with earth and it will look more like and underground structure protected by the wind, while four domes on the roof reduce the uplift of the roof.

via The first Earthship in Florida.

Check out their website: http://www.earthshipfloridaproject.com/