Livin off the Grid

[MD Dog]

Thanks for the inpute BB, BTW I love the new holiday moniker.

 

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[MD Dog]

I've decided to add a half acre swimming pond as well as a five acre fishing lake. Any body got any experience or tips on this one ?

 

[cavers5]

Love this thread, thanks! We're looking at having to install a new heating/cooling system and this is sure giving us some ideas!

Cavers5

 

[cavers5]

Forgot to add: Thanks WH for taking the time and trouble to post those videos! The sons and I loved them!

Cavers5

 

[MD Dog]

Here's something you guys are gonna say shows I'm crazy. So the boss lady and I are talking with a good friend of ours the other night who just happens to be a contractor. I told him about all my plans and he suggests something really radical. Now I didn't give it much thought at the time but the little woman tells me she thinks it would be an awsome Idea and the timming is right. We currently have a large 5000+sqft conventional framed home. Our contractor buddy suggested we either sell the home to be moved or tear it down and build a monolithic dome home and then bury it under 4ft of fill while keeping the structure itself above ground. So what do you think, crazy huh ?

 

[EDDE]

http://www.jcrefuge.com/


safe castle

 

[BuckleBoy]

Thanks for the inpute BB, BTW I love the new holiday moniker.

No problem. I'm happy to see a post like this.

As far as the holidays go...it's all for the Ratings.

 

[EDDE]

Here's something you guys are gonna say shows I'm crazy. So the boss lady and I are talking with a good friend of ours the other night who just happens to be a contractor. I told him about all my plans and he suggests something really radical. Now I didn't give it much thought at the time but the little woman tells me she thinks it would be an awsome Idea and the timming is right. We currently have a large 5000+sqft conventional framed home. Our contractor buddy suggested we either sell the home to be moved or tear it down and build a monolithic dome home and then bury it under 4ft of fill while keeping the structure itself above ground. So what do you think, crazy huh ?

safe bet HE or someone he knows will do the work

 

[MD Dog]

Here's something you guys are gonna say shows I'm crazy. So the boss lady and I are talking with a good friend of ours the other night who just happens to be a contractor. I told him about all my plans and he suggests something really radical. Now I didn't give it much thought at the time but the little woman tells me she thinks it would be an awesome Idea and the timing is right. We currently have a large 5000+sqft conventional framed home. Our contractor buddy suggested we either sell the home to be moved or tear it down and build a monolithic dome home and then bury it under 4ft of fill while keeping the structure itself above ground. So what do you think, crazy huh ?

safe bet HE or someone he knows will do the work

I thought that was kinda a givin. But some of the advantages to earth bermed housing is very attractive.

 

[Old Dog]

I have the utility company coming out sometimes as many as three and four time a month during the winter.
There is very little if any fluctuation in my natural gas usage over a winter, as compared to my summer usage.
And the electric has even dropped.
We have had an excruciating winter here and my highest bill is $112 for a month.
I heat my house with wood.
I prepare all year for this.
Starting in Spring we start collecting firewood, and save anything of size that will burn.
We use all the scrap from my business to make our own BTUs.

Just my 2 Wheaties worth
Thom

 

[diggemall]

MD;

Do some web searches for "passive annual heating" or "passive annual solar". You'll find a few references to burying the dome AND keeping the surrounding soil DRY. I a matter of a year or two, the earth around the home gets heated to where IT maintains an annualized average of 70 or so +/- a few degrees, with only modest solar input to maintain it. The key is in keeping it all DRY so moisture doesn't carry the latent heat away.

Fact is, there are lots of practical approaches to reducing heating / cooling costs down to zero or close to it. (Search "super-insulated homes" and the like for more ideas)

What I would like to see is an economical way to generate plenty (5,000 KWh / month) of electrical power cheaply and reliably, with maybe a 5-7 year pay-back.

Short of finding a place where I can install a small hydro plant, I'm stumped.

Diggem'

 

[MD Dog]

First off Diggem, nice to see your back, I heard a rumor you went missing fer awhile. Second, without hydro you'll need to either look at wind, solar or methane generation. I saw another type of combo of geo thermal/solar/wind It involved a concrete pad that was rather large I think they said it was sunk twenty feet deep by 100 ft circumfrence it had cells in a honeycomb pattern created by sinking pipes into it . They painted the whole thing black. then they created a glass tower that kinda looked like the stack from a nuclear power plant with a wind turbine installed in the top of the glass tower. what happens is the sun heats the concrete honey comb under the glass the air inside this area is heated and flows upward and out through the top of the tower turning the wind turbine and new air is sucked in all around the outside bottom edge of the glass tower. the concrete honey comb retains enough heat to continue turning the turbine all night.

For conventional solar cell electrical generation you'll need allot of space and up front money.

But then you may not live in an area that's good for solar. If you have enough room and the inclination you could raise animals and use their scat along with your own in combo with plant waste to create a methane generator. Otherwise wind generation would be your last hope but it is a good viable solution for many.

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

5000 Kwh

B

 

[diggemall]

Mrs O - Yeah, that's basically 5 megawatt-hours / month. (As you might guess, I don't much like my electric bill)

MD - I've been lookinig into the viability of using wind and/or solar to run a hydrogen generator to produce a storable fuel for a fuel cell generator. Lots of numbers to crunch........

We've got a number of large dairy operations around here that have installed methane digesters and run generators off of the gas they produce. It's a BIG investment, and requires a LOT of animals to maintain a 'steady' supply of gas. I'm not really certain my couple horses, cows, pigs and chickens could sustain our hunger for Kilowatts.

Diggem'

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Sorry 'bout that, but that is ONE big electric useage. I didn't use that much at the bar and restaurant - and that included 11 coolers, 6 freezers, an electric water heater, 3 3-bys, an ice machine and many, many lights for many hours a day.

I wouldn't like your electric bill either.

B

 

[MD Dog]

Maybe a combo of things Findem. Like part methane production in combination with wind turbine. I've got a horizontal WT mounted on my barn peak, that supplies most of my barn needs. The guys who are doing my rewiring for the hydro installation have it all apart right now but I plan to add another so I'll have two on the barn and another on our stables. We just started construction on our power house, but they keep havin to stop for the weather. I'm not sure of the all the numbers everyone is throwing at me when we add the methane generation system, but my wife jumped on the system cause she wants to return to an all wet/flush system.

Dog

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Diggemall,

Have you thought about how you would store all that (5,000 kwh of energy)?

B

 

[MD Dog]

Diggemall,

Have you thought about how you would store all that (5,000 kwh of energy)?

B

In a jar, silly.

 

[diggemall]

Diggemall,

Have you thought about how you would store all that (5,000 kwh of energy)?

B

That's why I want to generate Hydrogen with electrolysis - store the hydrogen to fuel a fuel cell generator for a steady supply of electricity.

Diggem'

 

[MD Dog]

With talk of gas prices reaching $10.00 a gallon, I've decided it's time to resurrect this thread. But I'd like to change it's focus somewhat and hear about others ideas or plans for transportation that is greener or less costly. For instance I've seen a bike converted to run on a weedwhacker engine so I'm lookin for plans on how to do that conversion and I'll post them if I find any suitable ones. I already own horses so don't go there.