What's new
  • Please note members who been with us for more than 10 years have been upgraded to "Veteran" status and will receive exclusive benefits. If you wish to find out more about this or support IcMag and get same benefits, check this thread here.
  • Important notice: ICMag's T.O.U. has been updated. Please review it here. For your convenience, it is also available in the main forum menu, under 'Quick Links"!

Time for electric bills to "necesarily sky rocket" as planned.

kln

Member
earthships are more than just some free electric from some pv's, ...they're homes that are designed to be completely self-sustaining so no electric bill, no gas bill, no water bill, no sewer bill, ...ALL infrastructure is designed and built into the building INCLUDING food production.

it's a beautiful concept that makes you almost completely free to use your money for things you actually want instead of having to spend 3/4 of it on bills.

anyway, here is a link to the Earthship website and if you know how to download torrents then go look for 'Garbage Warrior' and check it out.

http://earthship.com/

peace, SOG

i like your way of thinking, i've been always advocating permaculture.

I was browsing that earthship site, realized they ask 8k for only the drawing (design) of the home, isn't that to much?i have no idea of those kind of prices.
 

someotherguy

Active member
Veteran
i like your way of thinking, i've been always advocating permaculture.

I was browsing that earthship site, realized they ask 8k for only the drawing (design) of the home, isn't that to much?i have no idea of those kind of prices.

no man, that's not out of line with what you'd pay for architectural drawings if you were planning a standard house build.

...Mike Reynolds is an architect by trade but he's not about the money, that's just not his focus, for real, download that 'Garbage Warrior' video and you'll get a real feel for what makes this guy tick.

i'd also like to mention that this guy has been building these for near 40 years now and they have become more and more efficient as they've evolved and that most of the information you'd need to build yourself an earthship today and incorporate the latest developments is freely available if you go looking.

here's another link to a site where practically the entire build was documented on video so you can actually watch and learn the techniques employed to build these things, ...many people volunteer a few weeks of their time helping someone build an earthship in order to learn how to do it and then recruit volunteers when building their own spread, ...like the old time barn raisings kinda, lol.

http://www.offthegridbuild.com/

anyway, to me owning one of these would be the American dream. ...by that i mean it would be the closest thing to real freedom this country has to offer.

peace, SOG
 

kln

Member
More logic now, usually ppl that cares about the environment and ecology are not so money hunters.
Downloading garbage warrior atm!!

I don't live in usa or mexico, but i'll keep an eye of his events on europe, i might even buy his dvd's, i get quite interested by this kind of stuff.
 
Birtherism, thats so cute- I thought it went out of fashion a couple of years ago.

Thanks for that link I guess.

"The errant Obama biography in the Acton & Dystel booklet does not contradict the authenticity of Obama's birth certificate. ".


Had to step in the muck of Breitbart's site just for that.

Now I need a shower.

Oh, how cute! One of the last remaining cult members. What a darling little spectacle to see that there are still some around not too embarrassed to show themselves. We get it. Your redistributional messiah has been slightly critisized by being quoted verbatim, and that infuriates you into attack mode. Thanks, heh, I guess...........
-
Is that condescending enough?
 

zymos

Jammin'!
Veteran
Guess you are one of those people who just post links that they believe back of their points but actually don't bother to read them.
Cause yours even said that Obama was born in Hawaii.
 

bentom187

Active member
Veteran
i would like to see a nice combo between a earthship and a hempcrete house,its just a little more modern looking and has some additional properties as a benifit.

[YOUTUBEIF]eZbYsMsMW4Q[/YOUTUBEIF]
 

teemu shalanie

WeeDGamE StannisBaratheoN
Veteran
The reason they charge sooo much for our power and gas is I think they figger if u think its too pricey, you wont use soo much and they can ship the rest to china hmmmmm
TS
 
S

SeaMaiden

Edit: saw too late I spelled necessarily wrong in the title really wish we could edit those...


My electric bill is getting fuckin ridiculous and it was insane in the state I just moved from. Anyone else noticed for past 2 years? This is just jaw dropping...
Past two years is all you've noticed? I've been paying California power rates for the past 28 years, and they've always been much higher than the rest of the nation, and in the past few years have, with tiered pricing structures, risen even more. It's why we pushed so hard to take advantage of the federal Cash for Comfort home energy retrofitting program last year. It took a lot of pushing to get the full solar array we wanted, but we are now not only energy independent (still grid-tied), but will not suffer through more of PG&E's annual rate hikes, averaging just under 8% per annum, IIRC.

Power outages? Ha! Because I insisted they create a situation where we will always have power (long story re: solar generation and power outages, what happens during that time if you don't have a back-up gennie, legal CPUC stuffs) no matter the time of year or day, so we also have an 8KW back-up propane gennie, and it's automagic! I fucking love it!

I spent most of last year trying to get every homeowner I know to investigate the program. Our loan payment (@0% APR) is the same as an average PG&E payment, and PG&E was only electricity. We also had to buy propane to heat the house, cook and have hot water. Once our loan is paid up in 15yrs (14 by September), we own the PV array, generator and inverters outright. This adds value to a home purchased at the very height of the market and so needs value added back.

It's wonderful to NOT be looking at an $800 power bill at the height of summer, it's just an awesome feeling.

*~*~* THESE ELECTRONS BROUGHT TO YOU BY 100% PURE SOLAR ENERGY*~*~*
 

benjuanman

Active member
Veteran
I'm from Australia and our electricity prices are getting ridiculous. Last year the states electricity provider increased power rates by 15% to cover mantinence and crap like that. Now next month the government has decided to introduce a "Carbon Tax" which means we will be charged an extra 17% on our power bills. So 32% increase in 12mths is going to affect alot of people especially indoor growers. Some of our national charities such as St Vincent de Pauls have stated to current affair programs that there has been a vast increase of people seeking help with paying their electricity bills, and this is all before the new tax has been introduced. So I can't imagine how much worse it's going to get for low to middle class families in the future.
 

zymos

Jammin'!
Veteran
Yet you have to FEED the hamsters- no net energy gain.

Wait, maybe cogeneration, where you burn the hamster poop and it runs a generator....?
That plus their treadmill.....
....eureka, I've done it!!!!!
 

BudToaster

Well-known member
Veteran
In your dream how would this happen? Enlighten us.

of course, if i knew the answer, i would post it to the thread. (Just as i've posted complete design plans and software for my vaporizer.) but i've got some ideas i plan to pursue: (1) sterling engine using solar for the hot and river cooling for the cold. The energy comes from "milking" the temperature difference. (2) solar collector -- parabolic trench delivering heat to a working fluid (nitrogen, say) that is collected to boil water. (3) tidal water flow with a helix spinner.

the main problem is everybody to date working on energy wants to build a large, capital intensive system. that is just wrong. energy generation should be local generation with the grid collecting and redistributing when the local systems are below demand.

Looking at my all-electric operation, i use 3 kwh per hour. Really, a trivial amount of power. This can't be hard to generate.

Remember when Japan was dumping 4kb ram chips in the late 70s? That coincided with the introduction of the Atari 2600. The new video game console businesses sucked up every fucking RAM chip Japan could dump.

Today, China is dumping pv panels. Rather than socking them with an import tariff (since US has NO pv panel manufacturing to speak of), govt should buy all they can dump and put them on every fucking roof in USA.

But where's the will to do such a thing -- something that might actually help our economic situation -- jobs and free energy both.

Isn't this obvious?
 

Skinny Leaf

Active member
Veteran
It would help if we quit using 120vac to power everything. Most all appliances use a power supply to convert the 120vac into a lower vdc. If we had low voltage outlets in the house then the need for the bulky power supply in appliances would no longer be needed. If the power goes out then you could go on battery backup. May help reduce the size of solar panels needed and smaller sized wind generators. I'd say 48vdc would be a good common voltage that should run most everything in a house. Not to mention the lower dc voltage is a lot safer to work with and safer for people. Lot less risk of fire etc.....
 

ixnay007

"I can't remember the last time I had a blackout"
Veteran
It would help if we quit using 120vac to power everything. Most all appliances use a power supply to convert the 120vac into a lower vdc. If we had low voltage outlets in the house then the need for the bulky power supply in appliances would no longer be needed. If the power goes out then you could go on battery backup. May help reduce the size of solar panels needed and smaller sized wind generators. I'd say 48vdc would be a good common voltage that should run most everything in a house. Not to mention the lower dc voltage is a lot safer to work with and safer for people. Lot less risk of fire etc.....

Needs big old cables though. That and getting electrocuted with DC sucks, you just freeze on the line, AC pulses and you can jump back.

Neither method is healthy, but having taken a few 220v shocks, I prefer AC..
 

whodare

Active member
Veteran
There are numerous reasons why we use ac.

Biggest one being it's extrodinarily difficult to transmit dc over long distance making ac the more economically viable option.

For solar and energy storage dc is money though.
 
Top