Category: Sustainable Systems

How Sustainable Living Prepared Me for a Pandemic

I return to Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage for this video to talk about what awaited me on my return and how I was appreciating sustainable living systems I have set up because they have also prepared me in many ways for a pandemic. I have rainwater catchment, solar power, perennial fruit plants, seed supplies, renewable fuels, lots of food stores, some I grew myself and some purchased, and of course TP.

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An EARTHSHIP Like None You’ve Ever Seen

Last winter I had the chance to visit an earthship like none I’d ever seen before. Earthships are living buildings that are adapted to their environment to make use of climate, water, and waste products. When people think of earthships, they usually think of the desert southwest of the US, because that’s where they originated and where many of them are built. In this video we visit an unusual version of an earthship, still off grid, still adapted to its environment, but very different from what you normally envision when you think of an earthship.

The Craziest Cob House You’ve Ever Seen

Kyle’s Cob House at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage is one of the most unique natural buildings I’ve ever seen. It’s organic design incorporates a multitude of natural building techniques that will make your jaw drop. It’s earth bermed, it has stonework, a living roof, roundwood timberframing, cob, earth bags, an earthen floor, and much more. And like most buildings at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage, it’s a tiny house. Although still unfinished, it inspires many who visit DR and who have seen my videos about it.

My SIMPLE OFF GRID WATER system and fixing a pressure tank problem

Off grid water systems that meet most household needs can be set up with relatively little expense. A DC pump, a solar panel, batteries, and a pressure tank are pretty much all you need to get cold water into a house or to a field for agricultural applications.

I knew something was wrong with my system because the pump would kick on every ten to twenty seconds while I was using the water. Normally it should be kicking on every few minutes of extended water use. In this video I do some troubleshooting to figure out the problem and fix it so that I can extend the life of my pump. You might have the same problem sometime with your system.

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Urban Homesteading Community: Self-Sufficient in the City

On Hardcore Sustainable this week we travel to Gulfport, FL to visit Hummingbird Hideout, an urban homesteading community. It’s not easy to homestead out in the country without close neighbors and usually a family depends on a lot of technology to make their lives easier. Lots of stuff, like your own car, your own truck, your own tractor can cost a lot of money and make dependent on outside sources of income. With neighbors so distant, there is far less opportunity to share technology and resources. As well, a lot of people living in the city don’t how good they have it in terms of access to resources and the efficiencies that sharing with neighbors can bring. It might seem less likely, but there is a lot you can do in a city on a small piece of land to make your life more sustainable and self sufficient.

Folks at Hummingbird Hideout have set up systems to make even life in the city much more self sufficient by sharing with their neighbors and using permaculture systems to get more of their resources on site from the earth and the sky.

In this first of two videos, we get a tour of the systems they have set up at Hummingbird, and in the second video we’ll get a tour of their food forest and native plantings.

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How are plastic rings back?

25 years ago or so beverage companies voluntarily did away with plastic can rings under pressure from concerned consumers and environmental groups. Now they are back, and provide a great example of how capitalism is relentless in its drive to destroy the planet, and how in order to keep it from destroying the planet even faster, we have to be constantly vigilant in keeping it in check. It’s exhausting and requires way too much mental, financial, and political resources.