6 ms·

Living Off the Grid Under the Sun

43 points by x0054 11y ago

mike-cardwell 11y ago
"Completely off the grid" "Water is delivered to us on a truck every 6 weeks or so" I always thought "off the grid" meant that you were completely self sufficient. What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? [edit] Yeah. You know somebody is being very liberal with the usage of "Completely off the grid" when they have Internet access.
- adsche 11y ago
  > What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? It's in the text if it's not obvious: One of them is a limited supply. With the implication that you are more more water conscious.
  - leni536 11y ago
    And costs gas to be delivered. You can be more water conscious on the grid too.
- Gys 11y ago
  > The kitchen and water heater run on propane, which we purchase roughly once a year As in most places 'on the grid' in this world > [internet] about 18-20 Mbit down and 5-10 Mbit up As in 'by far better then most places in this world' So actually the 'off the grid' here means generating your own electricity and having a low latency (solvable by connecting directly to a nearby town that probably has a supermarket or such as well). Could be worse.
  - adsche 11y ago
    What "off the grid" here means is defined in the very first paragraph: "The house itself is [...] completely off the grid. It has no hookups for water, gas, or electricity." Of course it could be worse, but why should it have to? EDIT: Here you go: ><((((*>
    - mike-cardwell 11y ago
      "No hookups for water, gas, or electricity." So if I take my house in the middle of a city, get water delivered in containers, install solar panels and use my fireplace for cooking, I am now "completely off the grid" ? How about if I just eat out every day? Am I still off the grid? Should I disconnect my landline and just use a mobile phone instead?
      - shard 11y ago
        To me, off the grid refers to not being connected to the electric grid, with the broader meaning of not being connected to any public utilities. So your scenario of a house in the city getting wafer from delivery, electricity from solar, and firewood for cooking would be in my opinion "off the grid".
- profsnuggles 11y ago
  What is your definition of off the grid? I can't help but think you are being pedantic here. He mentions he could dig a well, but it's more cost effective to have water shipped in. As far as Internet access I'm sure that he needs it for his job so he can afford to purchase things like water or pay property taxes. At some point you have to interface with the rest of society, it is impossible for an individual to be 100% self sufficient.
  - mike-cardwell 11y ago
    I don't think I'm being pedantic when he says he is "completely" off the grid. If you're going to claim to be "completely" off the grid, then you should be completely self sufficient. Re digging a well. Is your definition of "off the grid" related to how much something costs? If it costs too much, we'll just pretend it's not included in the definition?
    - profsnuggles 11y ago
      How would he be completely self sufficient? He needs water and food at least. How do you dig a 200 foot well by yourself? Farming at the level actually needed to sustain someone year round is going to take more technology than my backyard garden. Is paying someone to come dig a well really that different than buying water? What if he was hypothetically able to purchase and store the amount of water that would be required to live the rest of his life? What happens when the well dries up? He gets someone that is on the grid to drill a new one? Doesn't that put him by proxy back on the grid?
      - icebraining 11y ago
        How do you dig a 200 foot well by yourself? You don't - you just live in a place where you don't need to dig one. For example, in my family's village in northern Spain, you have springs with reasonably clean water all year long; it's just a matter of walking a couple of miles with a jug. (Yes, I realize this is not realistic for the majority of the population. That doesn't mean "self-sufficiency" should lose its meaning)
      - 11y ago
- ZeroGravitas 11y ago
  > I always thought "off the grid" meant that you were completely self sufficient. What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? I think the difference is that one is delivered by a "grid" and one isn't, hence "off the grid". You seem to have mixed that concept up with self-sufficiency. For example, someone with a diesel generator for electricity could be described as "off the grid" though they'd need to take delivery of that fuel. edit: I see this same semantic discussion took place in another thread a couple of hours before this one.
adsche 11y ago
As someone who does not enjoy city life: Congrats, awesome. Why did you do it?
adsche 11y ago
Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mQPgnfOug8sJ:sdbr.net/post/Living-Off-the-Grid-Under-the-Sun/&strip=1&vwsrc=0 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mQPgnfO...
- joosters 11y ago
  Well at least the website is apparently off the grid :)
  - x0054 11y ago
    Yep :( Another server, a victim of HN. Actually this is just my private tiny VPN. Never expected it to get any meaningful traffic, so it was running a very restricting Apache setup. I am going to migrate over to Nginx, it's about time any way.
fanquake 11y ago
I'm somewhat curious as to why he's not collecting rainwater and using that rather than getting water trucked in; especially since he mentions it rains "a LOT". A quick Google suggests that area receives 200-300mm of rain a year, that would be enough to sustain two people. As for being off the grid; I grew up on a cropping farm which was fairly isolated, ~100km from the nearest large (>1000 people) town. Pretty similar weather conditions 45-50C max in summer and 200 - 300mm of rain per year. We had a family of 4, a few dogs and 2 workmen during seeding/harvest (4 months). We lived completely off rainwater, except for drought years, then we'd have to truck water from bores either on our farm, or somewhere nearby. Power was from the grid, except for outages (which could last a few days) or when poles caught fire and burnt down.. then we were looking for more than drinking water, as you have to fight your own fires. If the power wasn't back on after a decent chunk of time we'd get a generator running. Currently we're using solar panels, and hopefully we can start using something like a Powerwall fairly soon. We had dialup internet for quite a while. That only changed when a mobile tower was built nearby (5 years ago?). Then we had slow internet with a fairly bad cap. It used to be 10GB/month, it's 20GB/month now. The most off the grid I remember being was when we would sometimes have no power, internet, mobile or home phone. If you got into an accident/emergency during that you could be in a bit trouble.
- x0054 11y ago
  OP here: Hi there. Yes, I agree, I am not sure why the house wasn't built for collecting rainwater. It is something we have considered doing right away when we moved here, but at that moment we couldn't afford the investment. Long term it will be a valuable investment. On average it rains here for 10 days a year or so, but when it rains, it's really coming down. So all of the 200mm or so of rainfall come down within a period of about 2 weeks, usually around May and some times in August. So, the collection tank would have to be really large, 3,000+ gallons, to be useful. As for the internet, take a look at Satellite as a secondary connection, if you need it. I know Exede has some unlimited plans, but only in some parts of the country, the parts that are exposed to their newer beam. We are still on the old satellite, so we aren't that lucky.
imauld 11y ago
> Even though we do live in the desert, it is the high desert, and to my surprise, it rains a LOT out here Unless the climate has drastically changed since I was stationed in Twentynine Palms (about an hour away), it barely ever rained there. And it rarely snowed, it snowed one time in the 3.5 years I was there and it was quite a shock to people that had been there for far longer than myself. It did hail fairly often though even though it never stayed on the ground for very long (if at all).
- x0054 11y ago
  I have been to 29 Palms a few times, and the climate does differ quite a bit. It doesn't rain in Yucca a lot of the time, only about 10 days a year, I would say, but when it rains, it pores. Those pictures in the snow were taken in Joshua Tree National Park, about 5-8 miles from 29 Palms. But I do have to say that crossing into 29 Palms, you can feel the temperature going up. Not sure why, maybe it's lower.
cnvogel 11y ago
While I found the article quite interesting, the stuff he writes about his electrical work makes me think that he shouldn't really do electrical work in the first place: <quote> But when you are pumping 30 AMPS of current through an extension cord, you can’t just use any extension cord, you have to use the heavy duty, 8 gauge, super thick type. (...) But those who know me well, know that I am a cheap bastard, and I wasn’t about to spend $150 on what amounts to a bunch of wire.</quote> So to save money, he just parallels three cheap cables off Walmart using a splitter. Please don't do this without putting fuses in each individual cable to make sure the rating is not exceeded.
- x0054 11y ago
  OP here: I tested this system with a IR thermometer. Unplugging 2 out of 3 cables does make the remaining cable get warm after an hour of operation, but it doesn't burn, melt, or smoke. Running with just 2 cables, the system remains nice and cool, the third one is there for backup. In case of failure, if resistance on one of the cables goes up, the electricity will naturally flow through the other 2 cables with less resistance. Any short in any of the 3 wires will instantly trip the 30 amp fuse. If, for some reason, 2 out of 3 cables get unplugged, but not shorted, for some reason. The last remaining cable does have a potential to overheat after hours of operation, but the fuse should blow way before any significant problem could occur. It's just as unlikely that someone will come and neatly disconnect 2/3 extension cords as it is that 2/3 of the strands in the thick extension cord will be damaged, causing it to also overheat.
  - cnvogel 11y ago
    I really salute your diligent testing and the thought you've put into it, most people won't do that much. Then again, I also don't want to scare you by suggesting that your solution might burn down the house and kill the dog, and personally I might as well do the same if it's urgent and a one-off job for a day or two. But for what you describe, a semi-permanent solution expected to be put to use a few times a year, I personally would try to find the proper parts, used off eBay if necessary, and make a pretty cable run to the garage with the mobile home/generator, wiring boxes and properly rated sockets on both sides. Makes me sleep better, makes me not hunt for 1 of the 3 cables which I've misplaced because I've used them for mowing the lawn, and in the case of the very unlikely freak accident happening makes the electrician called to clean up the mess not ask stupid questions.
ilaksh 11y ago
Sounds awesome but I am wondering since you say you need 2,500 gallons of water every month and a half, is there a way to save some water? I always imagined an off-grid home making some minor sacrifices or adjustments to be more conservative in water and energy usage. Props for making the investment in the off-grid thing and actually doing it. But this is far from my sort of ideal when I think of off-grid. Although easy for me to talk when I take long showers and flush the toilet 4 or 5 times a day. The minimum you guys would need to survive would probably be like 3 gallons of water per day right? So you're using like 1600 gallons per month, versus the sort of 'ultra-conserve' minimum of no showers or toilet flushing etc. which might be 100 gallons per month (I know no one does that, but if they only use the bare minimum for drinking and cooking it is possible). So question is, do you have low-flow toilets and showerheads? Have you considered a composting toilet like Nature's Head or another one with peat or wood shavings delivery? Also as far as heating/cooling, that is probably the biggest energy usage. But my understanding is construction techniques (earth-ship, 'passive house' etc.) can reduce heating/cooling energy requirements by a massive amount, like 75% or more. To what degree is your house constructed using these energy saving techniques (number of windows, window placement, thick/insulated walls, thermal mass, airtight construction with heat recovery ventilator, etc.) and what percentage of your energy usage goes to air conditioning? Anyway congratulations on the conservation and efforts you are making for sustainability.. its easy for me to be critical and compare it to some fantasy idea I had.
- x0054 11y ago
  OP Here: All of those are really good ideas. It's an experiment me and my wife are living, I wouldn't claim we got everything right. We do use a fair bit of water, it works out to ~35 gallons a day. Google claims that an average family in US uses 300 gallons, just looked it up. So I guess we aren't doing too bad. All of our water features are low flow, of course. There are a few improvements which could really improve water usage. Our 2 biggest uses are showers and the toilet. If we could collect the shower water, and use it as gray water to flash with, it could be a good saving. We also wouldn't really need to go to a composting toilet. For instance, our RV toilet uses tiny amount of water to flash with, and it works just fine. Unfortunately, the way this house was designed, it makes it very difficult (basically impossible) to make plumbing changes. The entire house sits on a concrete slab, and all of the plumbing pipes are cemented in. The best way to go is to start collecting rain water, which just requires a big (2000 gallon or so) tank. We would need to place it below the house level, in the canyon to the right of the house. It's something we investigated, and intend to do as soon as we have the budget for it. Drilling a well would be an option, and I didn't want to give an impression that we are not doing it simply because of the money. The other issue is that all of our neighbors wells are drying out at the moment, and it's not clear what's going to happen to them in a year. As for the heating and cooling, this house is really good in that regard. The walls are very thick, and very insulated. They are at least 80% thicker than what I used to have in San Diego. The house maintains heat very well. In the summer time we use a swamp cooler (another water using device). We do not have an air conditioner. The swamp cooler does the trick by blowing outside air through a water impregnated paper membrane. It's basically a huge humidifier. Electrically it's very efficient, only using around 150-200 watts. It can bring the temperature down by 15° - 20° F. We also have fans all over the place. The roof top solar panels also add to the cooling of the house by blocking some of the direct sunlight. The house has lot's of windows, with wooden shutters to block out the sun. All of the windows are double panel, insulated, with aluminum frames, so there isn't much heat leaking out there. The doors do need upgrading however, and that's what we are doing now. I really love some of the ideas that I have seen when googling "earth-ship." Thanks for the reference! In any way, it's an experiment in progress, we are about 1 year into it. If we were designing this house from scratch, we would have made different design decisions. Such as gray water system, 12V DC as a secondary electrical system around the house, a rain water collection system, permanently installed backup propane generator, a green house, etc. For now we will work with what we have, and slowly upgrade some of these things, as possible.

43 points by x0054 11y ago

"Completely off the grid" "Water is delivered to us on a truck every 6 weeks or so" I always thought "off the grid" meant that you were completely self sufficient. What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? [edit] Yeah. You know somebody is being very liberal with the usage of "Completely off the grid" when they have Internet access.

adsche 11y ago
> What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? It's in the text if it's not obvious: One of them is a limited supply. With the implication that you are more more water conscious.
- leni536 11y ago
  And costs gas to be delivered. You can be more water conscious on the grid too.
Gys 11y ago
> The kitchen and water heater run on propane, which we purchase roughly once a year As in most places 'on the grid' in this world > [internet] about 18-20 Mbit down and 5-10 Mbit up As in 'by far better then most places in this world' So actually the 'off the grid' here means generating your own electricity and having a low latency (solvable by connecting directly to a nearby town that probably has a supermarket or such as well). Could be worse.
- adsche 11y ago
  What "off the grid" here means is defined in the very first paragraph: "The house itself is [...] completely off the grid. It has no hookups for water, gas, or electricity." Of course it could be worse, but why should it have to? EDIT: Here you go: ><((((*>
  - mike-cardwell 11y ago
    "No hookups for water, gas, or electricity." So if I take my house in the middle of a city, get water delivered in containers, install solar panels and use my fireplace for cooking, I am now "completely off the grid" ? How about if I just eat out every day? Am I still off the grid? Should I disconnect my landline and just use a mobile phone instead?
    - shard 11y ago
      To me, off the grid refers to not being connected to the electric grid, with the broader meaning of not being connected to any public utilities. So your scenario of a house in the city getting wafer from delivery, electricity from solar, and firewood for cooking would be in my opinion "off the grid".
profsnuggles 11y ago
What is your definition of off the grid? I can't help but think you are being pedantic here. He mentions he could dig a well, but it's more cost effective to have water shipped in. As far as Internet access I'm sure that he needs it for his job so he can afford to purchase things like water or pay property taxes. At some point you have to interface with the rest of society, it is impossible for an individual to be 100% self sufficient.
- mike-cardwell 11y ago
  I don't think I'm being pedantic when he says he is "completely" off the grid. If you're going to claim to be "completely" off the grid, then you should be completely self sufficient. Re digging a well. Is your definition of "off the grid" related to how much something costs? If it costs too much, we'll just pretend it's not included in the definition?
  - profsnuggles 11y ago
    How would he be completely self sufficient? He needs water and food at least. How do you dig a 200 foot well by yourself? Farming at the level actually needed to sustain someone year round is going to take more technology than my backyard garden. Is paying someone to come dig a well really that different than buying water? What if he was hypothetically able to purchase and store the amount of water that would be required to live the rest of his life? What happens when the well dries up? He gets someone that is on the grid to drill a new one? Doesn't that put him by proxy back on the grid?
    - icebraining 11y ago
      How do you dig a 200 foot well by yourself? You don't - you just live in a place where you don't need to dig one. For example, in my family's village in northern Spain, you have springs with reasonably clean water all year long; it's just a matter of walking a couple of miles with a jug. (Yes, I realize this is not realistic for the majority of the population. That doesn't mean "self-sufficiency" should lose its meaning)
    - 11y ago
ZeroGravitas 11y ago
> I always thought "off the grid" meant that you were completely self sufficient. What's the difference in relying on water being delivered by pipe and water being delivered by truck? I think the difference is that one is delivered by a "grid" and one isn't, hence "off the grid". You seem to have mixed that concept up with self-sufficiency. For example, someone with a diesel generator for electricity could be described as "off the grid" though they'd need to take delivery of that fuel. edit: I see this same semantic discussion took place in another thread a couple of hours before this one.

adsche 11y ago

As someone who does not enjoy city life: Congrats, awesome. Why did you do it?

adsche 11y ago

Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mQPgnfOug8sJ:sdbr.net/post/Living-Off-the-Grid-Under-the-Sun/&strip=1&vwsrc=0 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mQPgnfO...

joosters 11y ago
Well at least the website is apparently off the grid :)
- x0054 11y ago
  Yep :( Another server, a victim of HN. Actually this is just my private tiny VPN. Never expected it to get any meaningful traffic, so it was running a very restricting Apache setup. I am going to migrate over to Nginx, it's about time any way.

fanquake 11y ago

I'm somewhat curious as to why he's not collecting rainwater and using that rather than getting water trucked in; especially since he mentions it rains "a LOT". A quick Google suggests that area receives 200-300mm of rain a year, that would be enough to sustain two people. As for being off the grid; I grew up on a cropping farm which was fairly isolated, ~100km from the nearest large (>1000 people) town. Pretty similar weather conditions 45-50C max in summer and 200 - 300mm of rain per year. We had a family of 4, a few dogs and 2 workmen during seeding/harvest (4 months). We lived completely off rainwater, except for drought years, then we'd have to truck water from bores either on our farm, or somewhere nearby. Power was from the grid, except for outages (which could last a few days) or when poles caught fire and burnt down.. then we were looking for more than drinking water, as you have to fight your own fires. If the power wasn't back on after a decent chunk of time we'd get a generator running. Currently we're using solar panels, and hopefully we can start using something like a Powerwall fairly soon. We had dialup internet for quite a while. That only changed when a mobile tower was built nearby (5 years ago?). Then we had slow internet with a fairly bad cap. It used to be 10GB/month, it's 20GB/month now. The most off the grid I remember being was when we would sometimes have no power, internet, mobile or home phone. If you got into an accident/emergency during that you could be in a bit trouble.

x0054 11y ago
OP here: Hi there. Yes, I agree, I am not sure why the house wasn't built for collecting rainwater. It is something we have considered doing right away when we moved here, but at that moment we couldn't afford the investment. Long term it will be a valuable investment. On average it rains here for 10 days a year or so, but when it rains, it's really coming down. So all of the 200mm or so of rainfall come down within a period of about 2 weeks, usually around May and some times in August. So, the collection tank would have to be really large, 3,000+ gallons, to be useful. As for the internet, take a look at Satellite as a secondary connection, if you need it. I know Exede has some unlimited plans, but only in some parts of the country, the parts that are exposed to their newer beam. We are still on the old satellite, so we aren't that lucky.

imauld 11y ago

> Even though we do live in the desert, it is the high desert, and to my surprise, it rains a LOT out here Unless the climate has drastically changed since I was stationed in Twentynine Palms (about an hour away), it barely ever rained there. And it rarely snowed, it snowed one time in the 3.5 years I was there and it was quite a shock to people that had been there for far longer than myself. It did hail fairly often though even though it never stayed on the ground for very long (if at all).

x0054 11y ago
I have been to 29 Palms a few times, and the climate does differ quite a bit. It doesn't rain in Yucca a lot of the time, only about 10 days a year, I would say, but when it rains, it pores. Those pictures in the snow were taken in Joshua Tree National Park, about 5-8 miles from 29 Palms. But I do have to say that crossing into 29 Palms, you can feel the temperature going up. Not sure why, maybe it's lower.

cnvogel 11y ago

While I found the article quite interesting, the stuff he writes about his electrical work makes me think that he shouldn't really do electrical work in the first place: <quote> But when you are pumping 30 AMPS of current through an extension cord, you can’t just use any extension cord, you have to use the heavy duty, 8 gauge, super thick type. (...) But those who know me well, know that I am a cheap bastard, and I wasn’t about to spend $150 on what amounts to a bunch of wire.</quote> So to save money, he just parallels three cheap cables off Walmart using a splitter. Please don't do this without putting fuses in each individual cable to make sure the rating is not exceeded.

x0054 11y ago
OP here: I tested this system with a IR thermometer. Unplugging 2 out of 3 cables does make the remaining cable get warm after an hour of operation, but it doesn't burn, melt, or smoke. Running with just 2 cables, the system remains nice and cool, the third one is there for backup. In case of failure, if resistance on one of the cables goes up, the electricity will naturally flow through the other 2 cables with less resistance. Any short in any of the 3 wires will instantly trip the 30 amp fuse. If, for some reason, 2 out of 3 cables get unplugged, but not shorted, for some reason. The last remaining cable does have a potential to overheat after hours of operation, but the fuse should blow way before any significant problem could occur. It's just as unlikely that someone will come and neatly disconnect 2/3 extension cords as it is that 2/3 of the strands in the thick extension cord will be damaged, causing it to also overheat.
- cnvogel 11y ago
  I really salute your diligent testing and the thought you've put into it, most people won't do that much. Then again, I also don't want to scare you by suggesting that your solution might burn down the house and kill the dog, and personally I might as well do the same if it's urgent and a one-off job for a day or two. But for what you describe, a semi-permanent solution expected to be put to use a few times a year, I personally would try to find the proper parts, used off eBay if necessary, and make a pretty cable run to the garage with the mobile home/generator, wiring boxes and properly rated sockets on both sides. Makes me sleep better, makes me not hunt for 1 of the 3 cables which I've misplaced because I've used them for mowing the lawn, and in the case of the very unlikely freak accident happening makes the electrician called to clean up the mess not ask stupid questions.

ilaksh 11y ago

Sounds awesome but I am wondering since you say you need 2,500 gallons of water every month and a half, is there a way to save some water? I always imagined an off-grid home making some minor sacrifices or adjustments to be more conservative in water and energy usage. Props for making the investment in the off-grid thing and actually doing it. But this is far from my sort of ideal when I think of off-grid. Although easy for me to talk when I take long showers and flush the toilet 4 or 5 times a day. The minimum you guys would need to survive would probably be like 3 gallons of water per day right? So you're using like 1600 gallons per month, versus the sort of 'ultra-conserve' minimum of no showers or toilet flushing etc. which might be 100 gallons per month (I know no one does that, but if they only use the bare minimum for drinking and cooking it is possible). So question is, do you have low-flow toilets and showerheads? Have you considered a composting toilet like Nature's Head or another one with peat or wood shavings delivery? Also as far as heating/cooling, that is probably the biggest energy usage. But my understanding is construction techniques (earth-ship, 'passive house' etc.) can reduce heating/cooling energy requirements by a massive amount, like 75% or more. To what degree is your house constructed using these energy saving techniques (number of windows, window placement, thick/insulated walls, thermal mass, airtight construction with heat recovery ventilator, etc.) and what percentage of your energy usage goes to air conditioning? Anyway congratulations on the conservation and efforts you are making for sustainability.. its easy for me to be critical and compare it to some fantasy idea I had.

x0054 11y ago
OP Here: All of those are really good ideas. It's an experiment me and my wife are living, I wouldn't claim we got everything right. We do use a fair bit of water, it works out to ~35 gallons a day. Google claims that an average family in US uses 300 gallons, just looked it up. So I guess we aren't doing too bad. All of our water features are low flow, of course. There are a few improvements which could really improve water usage. Our 2 biggest uses are showers and the toilet. If we could collect the shower water, and use it as gray water to flash with, it could be a good saving. We also wouldn't really need to go to a composting toilet. For instance, our RV toilet uses tiny amount of water to flash with, and it works just fine. Unfortunately, the way this house was designed, it makes it very difficult (basically impossible) to make plumbing changes. The entire house sits on a concrete slab, and all of the plumbing pipes are cemented in. The best way to go is to start collecting rain water, which just requires a big (2000 gallon or so) tank. We would need to place it below the house level, in the canyon to the right of the house. It's something we investigated, and intend to do as soon as we have the budget for it. Drilling a well would be an option, and I didn't want to give an impression that we are not doing it simply because of the money. The other issue is that all of our neighbors wells are drying out at the moment, and it's not clear what's going to happen to them in a year. As for the heating and cooling, this house is really good in that regard. The walls are very thick, and very insulated. They are at least 80% thicker than what I used to have in San Diego. The house maintains heat very well. In the summer time we use a swamp cooler (another water using device). We do not have an air conditioner. The swamp cooler does the trick by blowing outside air through a water impregnated paper membrane. It's basically a huge humidifier. Electrically it's very efficient, only using around 150-200 watts. It can bring the temperature down by 15° - 20° F. We also have fans all over the place. The roof top solar panels also add to the cooling of the house by blocking some of the direct sunlight. The house has lot's of windows, with wooden shutters to block out the sun. All of the windows are double panel, insulated, with aluminum frames, so there isn't much heat leaking out there. The doors do need upgrading however, and that's what we are doing now. I really love some of the ideas that I have seen when googling "earth-ship." Thanks for the reference! In any way, it's an experiment in progress, we are about 1 year into it. If we were designing this house from scratch, we would have made different design decisions. Such as gray water system, 12V DC as a secondary electrical system around the house, a rain water collection system, permanently installed backup propane generator, a green house, etc. For now we will work with what we have, and slowly upgrade some of these things, as possible.