Friday 2 January 2015

The design

Exterior front wall with windows.

Floor plan.
Bird's eye view.

Here are some pictures of the final design. A greenhouse spans the length of the house, windows face SSE and are angled to the winter sun (passive solar gain). A sloped metal roof allows for rainwater harvesting. The walls are used tires rammed with earth. Before we can even start the house, we have to bury pipes for radon. There's a lot of radon in the soil here in the Prairies, which is the #2 cause of lung cancer (#1 is smoking, naturally). We need to lay down pipes to divert the radon so it doesn't leach into our house and kill us :) In fact, the Brandon Sun just did an article stating "More than 40 per cent of homes in the Prairie Mountain Health region contain higher than accepted levels of radon."

It has begun!

We have our building permit to build our dream home---an "earth-sheltered" house that uses a lot of sustainable architectural techniques similar to the Earthships that have been getting lots of attention lately. We'll be breaking ground in spring/summer 2015 as soon as the snow melts! Super excited!