[east2west]

I think it must be easy to keep this house at a constant temperature.

[emersonbiggins]

I don't know; that's a lot of windows getting large amounts of solar gain. I hope those are Low-E argon-filled.

[frankthetank]

Must be pretty damn strong. That machine has to weigh a pretty pound. I think maybe i'll dig a 30 foot hole in my basement (like saddam) and live down there. Better bring a Radon kit with me Even with my shallow 60ft well, my tap water is still about 53F.

[NEOPO]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', 'I') don't know; that's a lot of windows getting large amounts of solar gain. I hope those are Low-E argon-filled.

[nemo]

Modern insulation materials and sealed multi-pane window technologies are amazingly efficient. Throw in a counter-current heat exchanger for the ventilation air flow, and it's entirely possible to build houses that need no additional heating after the occupants' body heat and their cooking/consumer electronics/whatever have done their part. This works even in the sub-arctic winter.
I think bulldozer proof earthen roofs look cool and all, but it's hardly necessary for incredibly efficient insulation.

[cube]

How about a house made out of earth and sand bags? http://www.calearth.org

[billp]

Central heating and air conditioning may be proved to have been a bad idea?

I was around before both.

And recall heating with coal in Carrington, ND between about 1945-48.

Senior citizen

[nemo]

^^^^now that I like! It looks a lot like a cob building. I'd love to live in a house that looks like smurfs/hobbits belong there - square shapes and plane surfaces just feel boring. These bubbly 3D shapes just agree with me.


cob house interior.

Perhaps we ought to start a dedicated bubbly hippie house thread in some appropriate subforum?

[east2west]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', 'I') don't know; that's a lot of windows getting large amounts of solar gain. I hope those are Low-E argon-filled.

[cynthia]

"...bubbly hippie house thread..."
http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic26056.html
cynthia

[mekrob]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')^^^^now that I like! It looks a lot like a cob building. I'd love to live in a house that looks like smurfs/hobbits belong there - square shapes and plane surfaces just feel boring. These bubbly 3D shapes just agree with me.

[mekrob]

Do you guys think it'd be a good idea to have round corners in the walls? 1) You never use them. 2) Rounded would take up space and thus less heat/cooling needed. 3) Wouldn't it act like insulation to keep more heat inside? Instead of hot or cold air getting trapped in the corner of the room, it would be bounced off the wall. I've always wondered about this...

[frankthetank]

Too bad most people already have homes, and can't afford to go build some bunker in the side of a mtn. I think retrofitting an existing home would be more earth friendly anyways. I'm still thinking on how to superinsulate an area of my home for those cold, snowy, no electricity, no heat nights

[Pretorian]

the most energy efficient house is a sleeping bag.

[east2west]

I’m a bit confused about the round house in this post, and particularly the one with the high rounded ceiling and the window in the top. Wouldn’t this result in huge amounts of heat being lost?

[east2west]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('frankthetank', 'T')oo bad most people already have homes, and can't afford to go build some bunker in the side of a mtn. I think retrofitting an existing home would be more earth friendly anyways. I'm still thinking on how to superinsulate an area of my home for those cold, snowy, no electricity, no heat nights

[brobak]

For what its worth, I've actually done a lot of research on efficient home design in an attempt to educate myself and plan for my new home. To be perfectly honest, the final choice was a compromise of many factors, not least of which was 'will my wife live in it'. Plans ranged from smallish earth sheltered homes to passive solar, to conventional stick built but super insulated.

The final choice ended up being a passive solar, stick built home on 5.5 acres in WV. We're about 90 miles outside and to the NW of DC. I've got a good well, and two very small (I think they might go to a trickle in a sustained heatwave/drought) streams that border my lot. I've got about 4 acres of mature oak/maple with some pine scattered around here and there. Its near several huge apple and peach orchards, and I'm sure there must be some other farms around, though we're not moved in yet, so I'm not 100% sure of the area. One point of interest about the lot, is that its about 1/4 mile down the road from an eco-village named Broomgrass that I've heard about from time to time on NPR. Though I'm not a member of the community (couldn't possibly afford it), I hope that it bodes well that I am so close.

The house itself isnt as small or efficient as *I* would have liked, but its reasonable. My wife wanted larger, and we compromised. One thing I am lacking is good soil. My whole lot is basically shale. I'm going to have about 40 tons of topsoil brought in, but I dont think thats going to be nearly enough. There are plans for a large compost pile, which I can hopefully turn into at least a decent garden by mixing with what soil I'll have, and maybe using raised beds.

We're close to a large city, Martinsburg, but not too close, and hopefully not in a place of much interest, but...who can plan for that kind of stuff?

Its not perfect, but its better than where we were living, about 2 miles outside the DC line in a small suburb of washington on 1/5th of an acre.

The plans for the house were purchased from http://www.sunplans.com. Some of the other plans we looked at for the earth sheltered homes were from places like www.earthshelteredtech.com . It proved to be very difficult to get one of those built here on the east coast though. No one wanted to touch it, either for engineering purposes, the actual build contract, or more specifically, the concrete pours.

I'm hoping to be able to heat my house primarily with the sun in the winter, backed up by a soap stone woodstove, and with that backed up by an electric heat pump. West virgnia gets its electricity from coal. 98% in fact, and its cheap. 6.5c/kwh flat rate.

At those prices, it didn't make any sense for a solar array, so I'm holding off until a breakthrough (well, I'm praying for a breakthrough anyways) would bring the prices down in terms of $/watt.

I guess the bottom line is that I didn't build a bunker in the hills, but I did try to choose a place, and a home that should prove more sustainable and self sufficient than the previous place I was living. You can never know whats going to happen in the future, but I'm hoping that I've given my family at least a bit of a chance.

If you're interested, the latest pictures and progress can be found on my gallery: http://www.brianrobak.com/gallery/NewHouse along with a couple of hopes and dreams for the new house (like that kick ass fish tank )

[east2west]

I think it's a great design. I'm a huge fan of fish keeping too, so I really dig that tank!!!!. I have a 100 gallon myself, nothing like that tank in your gallery though. Currently I have 3 red belly piranhas.

Thats a very nice set up.

[dutchcyclist]

I think the 'passive house' is the most efficient house at the moment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house

[Cabrone]

Yes, PassivHaus is the most energy efficient criteria that I know of.

For Europe, a dwelling is deemed to satisfy the PassivHaus criteria if the total energy demand for space heating and cooling is less than 15 kWh/m2/yr and the total primary energy use for all appliances, domestic hot water and space heating and cooling is less than 120 kWh/m2/yr

Here's an interesting hobbit house that was put up in Wales and only cost £3000 to build.

http://www.simondale.net/house/index.htm