Earthships / Green Housing

CAP'N CRUNCHY
Earthships offer a model for green housing of the future

Looking to build an eco-friendly dwelling? An "earthship" could be just the
ticket, says Mike Reynolds. Inexpensive to construct and even less
expensive to run, these houses are built into hillsides, utilizing passive
solar design and the thermal properties of the earth to provide natural
climate control. Constructed of little but earth, plaster, trash (used
tires and discarded building materials), and large windows, the houses first
evolved in the arid lands around Taos, N.M., but have now spread as far
afield as Fife, U.K. Hallmarks of Reynolds' earthship design are systems
that capture and use rainwater, process sewage through plant beds, and
generate electricity on site. So far, the designs are only found outside of
urban centers, but Reynolds would like to see that change. "If we were to
get into a place like Brighton [U.K.], I'd buy an east-west running city
block, tear everything down, salvage all the materials and put up a bank of
earthships ... People would go apesh*t! Soon other city blocks would be
coming down."

straight to the source: The Guardian, Steve Rose, 29 Nov 2004