by Peter McIntosh | Feb 15, 2016 | Earth theory, Sustainable building
Choosing the right foundation: How materials, ground type, and sustainability shape your natural building’s stability Foundations for conventional building have, to a large extent, a one size fits all approach regardless of the type of ground you are building on i.e....
by Peter McIntosh | Nov 23, 2015 | Adobe, Architecture award, Clay, Cob, Compressed Earth Brick (CEB), Design competition, Events, Light Earth, Mud brick, Natural building, Strawbale, Sustainable building, Sustainable human settlements
The TERRA award is a collaborative effort on an international scale to enable both professionals and the general public to fully appreciate earth’s increasing popularity as a building material of high aesthetic and technical quality. Earth is becoming...
by Peter McIntosh | Sep 11, 2015 | Adobe, Alternative building, Alternative energy, Clay, Cob, Insulation, Living off-grid, Living Sustainably, Mud brick, Natural building, Natural building methods, Passive Solar Design, Permaculture, Peter McIntosh, Solar energy, Strawbale, Sustainable building, Sustainable human settlements, Thermal mass, Thermal performance
Passive solar design can dramatically reduce our demands on fossil fuels and other forms of energy input, allowing our buildings to become producers and not consumers of energy and resources, supporting us in a healthier more comfortable abundant way. Passive solar...
by QPT Qala Phelang Tala | Sep 30, 2014 | Adobe, Amanda de Gouveia, Anita Venter, Clay, Cob, Community, Earth testing, Events, Insulation, Local materials, Mud brick, Natural building, Peter McIntosh, Qala Phelang Tala, Sand, Start Living Green, Sustainable human settlements
Imagine being outside on a chilly Free State winter morning with the sun just coming out and starting to gently warm your body. Now imagine being told to take off your shoes in order to trudge in icy cold mud. I glanced at my fellow volunteers and I saw a collective...
by Peter McIntosh | Jun 3, 2014 | Adobe, Clay, Cob, Compressed Earth Brick (CEB), Earth testing, Earth theory, Mud brick, Natural building, Natural building methods, Peter McIntosh, Rammed Earth, Sand, Sandbag, Strawbale, Sustainable building
By Peter McIntosh (Please note that in order to understand what is written here you will need to have read my previous post on understanding earth) Earth requires two properties to make it strong enough for building, compressive and tensile strength. In much the...
