The other day, I was thinking about how to make houses more eco-friendly. What if we built houses from scratch to be as sustainable as possible? And then maybe even entire communities?

I’m hoping people can suggest materials and processes. For example, we could have dry bathrooms, solar panels on the roof, and systems to capture and purify rainwater for different uses like bathing and washing. We could also reuse that water multiple times or use it to water gardens.

Imagine building houses using recycled materials like tires or eco-bricks. We could generate energy with workout bikes or small water mills. Using locally made eco-friendly soap and shampoo would be a must. Growing an orchard and buying locally would be ideal too.

We also need to consider the environmental impact of transporting materials. The whole process should be as eco-friendly and cheap as possible.

I know a bit about this, but I’d love for others to share their knowledge. By combining what we know, we can turn this idea into a reality. If we build a model eco-friendly house, we can use it to guide updates for existing homes.

I’d appreciate help in sharing this idea on relevant subreddits, as I’m not familiar with many.

I’ll focus on my area—Poland. When thinking about eco-friendly building, materials are the first priority. Though I’m no expert and open to more ideas, I’d use hempcrete, wood, bamboo (not local), metal for support, and hemp for insulation.

Next is the design. I prefer medium to high-density buildings (150-300 people). For such buildings, a square base works if there’s no courtyard, and a rectangular base if there is. Apartments should face north (with a ±30° margin). Imagine an equilateral triangle pointing north, with large windows on the inner side for sunlight. The building would be six stories high (excluding the basement).

To avoid disputes over room angles, we can use corners for large water tanks: one for untreated rainwater, one for treated sewage, and one for drinking water. This setup allows separate water streams: one for drinking and cooking, and one grey water stream for showering/washing/flushing.

The building would have a two-story basement. The first level for sewage treatment and rainwater filtering, and the second for battery storage (using eco-friendly saltwater batteries).

Inside, the first two floors would house students (they can be loud) and the elderly (less noise and easier access). The third floor would be for social utilities like a laundry, community kitchen, pantry, library, kindergarten, and gym. Floors four and five would be residential, mainly for families and friends. At this height, they can see tree crowns outside, providing privacy.

The sixth floor would be a greenhouse, with half of the roof covered in solar panels, combining greenhouse and solar energy. Produce can be stored in the community pantry for everyone.

Another thing to consider is that houses need to be designed for the specific region they are in. For example, the southeastern coast of the U.S. needs to handle heat, humidity, hurricanes, and occasional freezing. Overall, the weather will get warmer, but severe events will become worse and more frequent.

I’m interested in the Pacific Northwest, where we need to prepare for big earthquakes, but usually, it’s cool and rainy. However, Portland did hit 116°F last summer!

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution. We might consider looking back at traditional regional building styles, as they were created for good reasons. Though, modern conveniences like window screens, TV, and air conditioning have changed a lot of that.

Jumping in to add my favourite type of house (one I still hope to build one day!)

cob houses, http://tinyhousetalk.com/wp-content/uploads/Cob-House-Sustainable-Building-Exploring-Alternatives-1.jpg

And straw bale houses, https://dornob.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/straw_bale_house_padgitt_2.jpg

I find them beautiful, easy to build, durable and sustainable.

I would second the other ideas in this thread of passive solar, rainwater catchment etc.

I would love to live in a village of cob tiny houses…

As what other people have said, it depends on the region, the availability of specific types of resources and the environments where these homes will be.

Break it down between new construction and old construction (existing buildings)

New Construction

Depending on the climate and the potential hazards, combined with the natural available resources and biome, along with social factors.The best place to start would be in urban planning. Before any building goes up, the entire development should be planned out or at least thought out with ecological and social topics in mind. These plans should balance individual privacy and autonomy, community areas and commons, density, transportation, and the local ecology and geology. It is important to have communities in the best areas possible to handle floods, storms, fire, and other natural factors. Things like rammed earth can survive fires and tornadoes but may not do well in hurricanes and floods. Everything has a place. This video can lay out some things to keep in mind when thinking about this. A ton can be said about urban planning this channel is great when it comes to explaining the fails and wins of what kinds of urban planning really make people happy.

Another question with urban development and ecological housing is how to balance density with the environment while keeping the individual, the collective and the environment working in a symbiotic relationship.That focus would be towards minimizing the need for external factors, minimizing electrical, water and HVAC use and maximizing passive solutions or low tech solutions. Other people mentioned earth ships, and they use passive options like long tubes in the ground that act as low tech AC. But why would this matter? Because if passive heating, cooling and lighting is built into the design of the buildings, before they are even built, that will change their shape and how they interact with the environment as a whole.This is another great video that covers a lot of passive building, but making sure it all interacts and one persons building is not shading another.

From there you can talk about building materials, building types, earthships vs yurts vs geodesic domes vs aircrete domes etc. But ultimately it is more important to understand the systems that go into a home and get as close to a closed loop system as possible.Water for example can be collected through rain water, and used for drinking, or showering. That used water is also called grey water and can be reused as long as there are soaps and stuff that don’t hurt plants, and that grey water can be used to water plants, the excess of that can go to flushing a toilet, then the sewage also called black water, goes to a septic tank to take out the solids, and the water from that is used in outdoor areas with soil. So the water never really goes to waste, there is always a use. It minimizes how much water gets used in the total system. And that should be the goal. Reuse things when you can, as much as possible and minimize waste.Once you get this idea in your mind, think about other ways our current system wastes electricity, heat, cold air, and think of different ways you can harness that as much as possible.

With that include different natural resources into that system. Hemp is amazing because it is a plant that sequesters carbon, can be used for making herbal medicines and other non psychoactive uses, it grows incredibly fast, the fibers can be used to make clothes, paper, and even wood. It is an incredible plant that was replaced with plastics because you guessed it. Capitalism and corporate greed. With your points on supply chains, these homes also would double as greenhouses and have areas inside and out. Inside, more exotic plants can be grown year round, out of season since all the inputs (water, temp, humidity, light) can be controlled. So that cuts down on needing outside resources if you can grow them indoors, locally.

Same idea with aquaponics to tie in recycling and food systems. Grey water is used for the fish water (if it doesnt have soap and if safe for fish), the fish will grow and poop, that fish water is actually amazing for plants, so that is given to the plants, and that water then goes to flushing your toilet and so on. Then you have awesome veggies, fruit, whatever you want to grow along with fish as a protein source either for you, your animals or just keep them as pets.

Circular patterns and systems.

Old Construction

Big thing I see in a ton of solarpunk aesthetics is a focus on a far off future world. Which is great and I want that all. But what about the near future? What about the homes and apartments and high rises that are already here? Is is ecological to demolish them to make super adobe homes? Or is it better to retrofit and upgrade where we can, and anything new we need to build will be ecological and follow the ideas other people are suggesting in here as well?

Big one will be insulation. Many homes are poorly insulated and at the moment most countries are using fiberglass. There are plenty alternatives that not only sequester carbon, but has a bunch of different uses. You guessed it. Hemp. So instead of knocking existing homes down, we make them better insulated. Change their systems when we can to be more like earth ships and other ecological homes. On a municipal level, we can do the same things but at scale with the same infrastructure we have now that is going to waste.Turn abandoned malls and office buildings into housing. In the US we have even right now as we speak, enough vacant housing to house everyone.On top of that moving our electrical systems over to renewables to cut fossil fuel use and eventually eliminate it.

All of this is possible, though a ton of work is needed. I am confident if people have a vision, we can reach a better world.

Passive House construction is a materials-agnostic building standard. It sets targets for insulation, air-tightness, and energy use. It’s the most flexible protocol of it’s type in my opinion.

Source: I am a Certified Passive House Builder based in WA, USA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house

I believe that net impact and lifestyle impact matter more than a choice of materials. Not to suggest that there is anything wrong with using better materials, but defining sustainability in terms of a consumer choice of materials alone falls for the con of ‘consumer environmentalism’ where the public is made to take the blame, guilt, and responsibility for the actions of executives and their pet politicians. Therefore, there is no single ideal. It is dependent on context. A second-hand mobile home can be more sustainable than an off-grid straw bale McMansion built on virgin land on the edge of wilderness –especially if that location is used as an excuse for owning a luxury SUV and commuting hundreds of miles to work and shopping, eventually compelling government to build more roads. No amount of solar panels can make up for that sin.

Regardless of materials, the more sustainable habitat is always an urban one –if not necessarily in the form of the pathologically managed cities of the present. Unfortunately, we do have this problem that corrupt municipal governments drive people to the edge of wilderness just for the freedom to use new and more sustainable building methods that, to have any significant positive impact, need to be used on mainstream housing, not the owner-built dream homes of a lucky few. As we say in the Southwest, everything new ends up in the desert because that’s where you have to go to be left alone. The desert southwest is littered with the ruins of countless grand follies, broken dreams, and good ideas forgotten. Obviously, if such technology is to become mainstream, its use must be demonstrated somewhere. But it would be far more effectively demonstrated in the urban context of the intentional community or eco-village than the discrete home hidden in the wilderness. (which explains exactly why such technology gets relegated to that wilderness in the first place…)

In the wilderness, a choice of ‘green’ materials is largely an aesthetic choice with insignificant net impact, though possibly some health benefits. In that context, what is far more important is minimizing the direct impact of the discrete dwelling on an immediate environment that is probably much better off left alone. As someone compelled to live alone in the desert by health problems created by this pathological culture, I’m mindful of the irony of being here, in a landscape that should be left alone. I feel living here demands a modesty in scale and a lightness and minimalism in architectural design. Homes out here should never be regarded as permanent and instead designed with the intention that, eventually, they can return to the earth or be easily removed leaving as little physical trace as possible. I think that will become the convention –if not a strict requirement– in the future for all non-urban dwelling. If that can be realized with better materials, great! It’s mot impossible. But if you need to go high-tech to minimize that impact, OK. Better the rare and small Futuro made of plastic that can be removed to a landfill leaving no trace behind than something demanding extensive clearing and grading killing trees and displacing wildlife, a heavy foundation damaging water tables, all leaving a scar on the land for centuries.

The notion of ‘land improvement’ that drives our real estate industry is fundamentally delusional. There is no such thing. Every human construction is a degradation, perhaps necessary for our needs, but we should be mindful of this essential fact so as to not create with hubris and waste. This isn’t outer space. The space we use we only borrow, violently and unilaterally, from a living natural environment that had its own prior uses for it.