Earthships: Self-Sustaining Homes
by Justin Thomas, Virginia 
on 06.11.05
My first encounter with Earthships was by accident. I was driving through the New Mexican desert, on my way to Taos. Off in the distance I could see some strange buildings and I said to the two ladies with me "What are those odd structures — those unusually shaped buildings — what could they possibly be?" Little did I know they were Earthships — houses designed to be self-sustaining as possible. They are usually made of concrete blocks, aluminum cans and used tires packed together with rammed earth.
They also usually make use of solar power, passive heating, thermal mass and greywater recycling for indoors gardens. All very innovative, great stuff. Earthships also tend to be very vernacular or even, shall we say "eccentric", in their design. But the next time I'm in New Mexico I'll rent one for the night. :: Earthships (thanks to Lloyd for the tip).
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Ah... Not concrete blocks. They are made with used car tires filled with dirt and packed with a sledge hammer so they weigh around 300 lb each. Then they use the tires like bricks.
What a wonderful answer to living in the harsh climate of the desert! I recently had to visit Las Vegas for a convention and was horrified at the amount of waste. Nevermind all the white trash gorging on all those all-you-can-eat inland shrimp, but a city has no place existing there! It takes (and wastes) so many resources for those people to selfishly live on the hot valley floor.
However, kudos to the Ethel M Chocolate Factory! They have a wonderful cactus garden and water recycling ecosystem on their site. Almost worth the trip to Vegas!
What a wonderful answer to living in the harsh climate of the desert! I recently had to visit Las Vegas for a convention and was horrified at the amount of waste. Nevermind all the white trash gorging on all those all-you-can-eat inland shrimp, but a city has no place existing there! It takes (and wastes) so many resources for those people to selfishly live on the hot valley floor.
However, kudos to the Ethel M Chocolate Factory! They have a wonderful cactus garden and water recycling ecosystem on their site. Almost worth the trip to Vegas!
I have been following earthships for 10 years or more. My wife and i have seriously discussed making an offgrid lifestyle our lifestyle. When the kids grow up we plan on making our dreams a reality
does anyone know of earthships in British Columbia. I'm near Vancouver in Sept 05 and would like to rent one if possible for a few days. Thanks in anticipation.
Except beware of these Earthships guys, they're a bit of a cult! Angels Nest hired Tai Robinson to retrofit their old Hummer to run on hydrogen. It was a grand idea! Electrifying Times helped Tai with PR for the vehicle when they drove it all over California during the Governator campaign, garnering national headlines. Sadly, out of shear jealousy or maybe just plain stupidity at the publicity Tai was getting, rather than try to capitalize on his sudden popularity, and use the bandwagon to grow their own business, they ultimately tore out all of Tai's H2/AFV retrofit from the vehicle, which now rests idle and broken somewhere until someone else can restore it. Yours truly still own and operate the domain name for the campaign, if anybody's curious... http://www.greenhummer.info but most the good stuff was ripped down from the website, because Angels Nest claimed copyright. Silly, petty crap!
I have a similar opinion - that there is something a little cultish about the earthship movement. The problem seems to be that you can't question the perfect design - its become a generic brand-named thing and as such can't really be 'eco'. Eco-architecture should evolve out of its environment - so perhaps earthships are appropriate near a car tyre dump in Taos - but they are popping up all over - Scotland, Brighton UK etc..
I don't have one, and may well never, since the sheer number of labor-hours is quite intimidating, but very little about the design *requires* a desert climate.
I KNOW I won't ever be a resident of New Mexico, but discarded tires are sadly prevalent all across the nation.
I wouldn't feel married to the particulars, though. I just like the basic overview; tires, rammed earth, photo-voltaics, water collection, etc. The aesthetic leaves a little "sumpthin sumpthin" to be desired.