Green & Alternative Home Building

[John Raabe]

Here is a valuable link to many green and alternative buiding materials and home building techniques.

http://greenhomebuilding.com/

However, I don't agree with ALL the assumptions of this site. For instance, many green proponents think building houses with wood products is a no-no.

It seems clear to me that wood is one of the most renewable materials on the planet. It is a very efficient embodiment of stored solar energy and is easily recycled into the soil where the minerals are released to recombine with water and sun to make more fiber.

While there are areas of the country where timber is over harvested, the fact is that even with our exploding population, urban growth, and all the wood buildings that have come and gone, the U.S. now has 20% more land in forests than it did a hundred years ago.

I think we should really have two types of forests.
• Forest lands that are left as natural as possible and comprises a protected ecosystem (probably the national parks and national forests). These, if timber is taken at all, must be harvested very carefully and with as little impact as possible.
• Forest lands that are basically farms for wood fiber. These can be harvested and processed into products that give the highest efficiency for their intended use such as I-joists, OSB and other fiber products yet to be invented. These will make our smaller buildings what they are now - easily built and remodeled and ultimately returned to the earth.

[DavidLeBlanc]

One thing that irks me no end about harvesting of wood on federal land is that the government not only does not recoup the cost of making the resource available, they also don't even recover the cost of recycling the land and starting it on producing another crop.

[Amanda_931]

I find that greenbuilder's site annoying at times.  For the same reason as John.

But "low impact" to me means not running things around the world a couple of times before the end  consumer gets them.  

Cloth (fiber) is or has been exceptionally bad about this--grown (or made) in one country, shipped elsewhere to be spun, woven in a third, printed in a fourth, cut in a fifth, finished as clothing in a sixth, sold either back in an earlier country (fifth?), or the seventh.

Of course we could plant some bamboo, nurture it for six or eight years, then make our Simon Velez lookalike house out of it--not, I'm afraid!

But that stuff is exciting looking.  Run a search.  Grow your own house is definitely a misnomer.

That kind of bamboo--Guadua--probably won't grow here, seems like it grows where coffee does, and the nearest oriental equivalent--Moso--is iffy in USDA zone 6.

Says the person who is still unable to break her addiction to driving as pleasure!

[John Raabe]

Here is an example house done by some folks that have been writing and researching these types of materials for many years.

http://oikos.com/library/showcase/iris_communications/index.html

I used to do training workshops with these folks on energy efficient construction.
• Click the product links at the top of the page for product research information.
• Click library links for more projects and articles.

[Chuck_Surette]

Building with what other people throw away-

Dan Phillips - saw the article in Jan. 01 Fine Homebuilding, pg. 94,

Builds low priced - high detail housing with others cast offs - some pretty cool stuff.

If you check out the photo section of the site notice house 2 - it's themed after something near and dear to many carpenters and non-carpenters alike.
(beechwood aged)

http://www.phoenixcommotion.com/mission.html

[glenn kangiser]

Thanks for that link, Chuck - I got stuck reading, looking and thinking there for a while.  

[Chuck_Surette]

Glen,

My pleasure- check out the Fine Homebuilding article on Dan Phillips - it's a good piece.  That article on what he built with scraps, is one of the things that make me believe.....
I can one day... build my own house.

He even recycled Hickory nuts, as spacers, for a drawer pull!!  He is a nut!

More links:

Article in Reason:

http://reason.com/0210/ci.sr.trashy.shtmlArticle%20by%20an%20employee%20WITH%20GOOD%20PICTURES%20[url]http://www.geocities.com/designertexas3/pasthouses.html

You can buy one of his houses ( It's CHEAP )
http://www.homelandprop.com/910University.htm

[glenn kangiser]

My Indian friend showed me that you can make great beads from large pine seeds (Bull Pine) - grind each end off and push out the meat -string it- could work for room divider curtain- decoration- etc. depending on how energetic you are.