Sustainable Homes Books.
Sustainable House
Whether you’re planning to build or renovate, whether you live in an apartment or a house, Sustainable House is the essential guide to help you achieve an environmentally friendly home. It includes advice on converting your kitchen, bathroom, water supply, energy, waste system and garden, as well as tips for working with councils, builders and engineers, and the costs and benefits associated with making your home sustainable. First published in 1998, this long-awaited second edition covers the revolutions that have since occurred in sustainable housing, and, critically, includes the author’s assessment on technologies and materials used in his own ground-breaking Sustainable House 14 years after installation. Michael Mobbs tells you what pitfalls to look out for and how to choose the best systems, products and suppliers.Earthbag Architecture
For the first time, we can see what happens in a sustainable house after 14 years of use. Did the solar panels last? Is rainwater in the city safe to drink? How has the garden handled over one million litres of treated sewage? Discover how you can build an amazing variety of structures using little more than the earth beneath your feet. Earthbag building is revolutionizing how people around the world are thinking about ways of providing shelter, both temporary and permanent. Such buildings can be remarkably durable and resistant to earthquakes, floods, fires and even bullets. Kelly Hart describes the basics of how to build this way, provides a history of the evolving technology and delves into detailed descriptions of the many different earthbag projects that he has been involved with over nearly two decades. A survey of 64 unique buildings from around the world proves just how versatile this approach to building can be. A look to the future of earthbag building and a Resource Guide complete the book. Some 240 colour photographs help you visualize the possibilities of this unusual and sustainable approach to architecture.Sustainable Home Design
Many people dream of building a beautiful, environmentally friendly home. But until now there has been no systematic guide to help potential builders work through the complete process of imagining, planning, designing, and building their ideal, sustainable home.
Essential Sustainable Home Design walks potential homebuilders through the process starting with key concepts, principles, and a project vision that will guide the house to completion.
Ideal for owner-builders and sustainable building contractors working with clients aiming to design and build a sustainable home.
Chris Magwood has designed and built some of the most innovative, sustainable buildings in North America, including the first off-grid, straw bale home in Ontario. He is co-founder and director of the Endeavour Centre for Innovative Building and Living and co-editor of the Sustainable Building Essentials series. Chris is the author of Essential Prefab Straw Bale Construction, Essential Hempcrete Construction, Straw Bale Details, More Straw Bale Building, and Making Better Buildings.
Earth-Sheltered Houses
An earth-sheltered, earth-roofed home has the least impact upon the land of all housing styles, leaving almost zero footprints on the planet.
Earth-Sheltered Houses is a practical guide for those who want to build their own underground home at a moderate cost. It describes the benefits of sheltering a home with earth, including the added comfort and energy efficiency from the moderating influence of the earth on the home’s temperature (keeping it warm in the winter and cool in the summer), along with the benefits of low maintenance and the protection against fire, sound, earthquake, and storm afforded by the earth. Extra benefits from adding an earth or other living roof option include greater longevity of the roof substrate, fine aesthetics, and environmental harmony.
The book covers all of the various construction techniques involved, including details on planning, excavation, footings, floor, walls, framing, roofing, waterproofing, insulation, and drainage.
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Specific methods appropriate for the inexperienced owner/builder are a particular focus and include:
- Pouring one’s own footings and/or floor
- The use of dry-stacked (surface-bonded) concrete block walls
- Post-and-beam framing
- Plank-and-beam roofing
- Drainage methods and self-adhesive waterproofing membranes
- The time-tested, easy-to-learn construction techniques described in Earth-Sheltered Houses will enable readers to embark upon their own building projects with confidence, backed up by a comprehensive resources section that lists all the latest products such as waterproofing membranes, types of rigid insulation, and drainage products that will protect the building against water damage and heat loss.
Rob Roy is a former contractor with 27 years of experience and 12 previous books to his credit, including Cordwood Building and Timber Framing for the Rest of Us. An expert on underground building, he founded the Earthwood Building School in 1981 with his wife, Jaki, and is frequently a speaker at events throughout North America.
Hempcrete Construction
Hempcrete is a versatile, energy-efficient natural insulation material, useful for walls, roofs, and floors. Made from the inner stem of the hemp plant mixed with a lime-based binder, it is a very strong, lightweight and breathable alternative to manufactured insulations. Essential Hempcrete Construction is a fully-illustrated practical guide to this affordable, renewable method, from procurement to finishing.
This indispensable manual is packed with all the information you need to determine whether hempcrete is the right choice for your project. It covers:
Material specifications, testing and building code references and climate data Detail drawings for design reference Tool lists, and complete step-by-step instructions for mixing and placing hempcrete Finishing and maintenance techniques Budgeting and labor estimates Additional resources
Essential Hempcrete Construction is part of New Society’s Sustainable Building Essentials Series. Written by the world’s leading sustainable builders, designers and engineers, these succinct, user-friendly handbooks are indispensable tools for any project where accurate and reliable information are key to success. Get the Essentials!
Chris Magwood is a sustainable builder and designer specializing in green and natural building techniques, the co-founder and co-director of the Endeavour Centre, and the author of several books on sustainable building including Making Better Buildings, More Straw Bale Building, and Straw Bale Details.
House Of Earth.
Earth is the mother of all construction materials. For thousands of years, clay-soil has shown itself to be a versatile building material. Today people are rediscovering the advantages of earthen construction and for good reasons: it’s easy to work with, extremely affordable, environmentally friendly, durable and beautiful! All you need to get started is basic equipment: buckets, shovels, and a wheelbarrow. This manual shares the most popular and time-tested techniques for building with: Cob, Adobe, Light straw-clay, Earth bags, Earthen plasters, Earthen floors, Clay paints.
These techniques can be used to build entire houses as well as for smaller projects, such as backyard sheds, cabins, outdoor fireplaces, garden walls and play houses. As a bonus, the appendix has complete instruction on how to build an earthen bread- and pizza oven that makes for a great starter project!
Earthen building methods can also be used to renovate existing homes on a shoestring budget, transforming run-down houses into earthen homes, without having to work with toxic or environmentally harmful building materials. You will realize how simple it is so to integrate earthen materials with conventional building materials.
This comprehensive volume covers everything from identifying the right materials to how to build arches and niches and incorporate plumbing and electrics.
Building With Cob
The ancient method of cob building uses a simple mixture of clay sub-soil, aggregate, straw and water to create solid structural walls built without shuttering or forms, onto a stone plinth. It is now undergoing a renaissance as an ‘eco-friendly’ building material because of its amazing ‘green’ credentials. ‘Building with Cob’ shows how to apply this ancient technique in a wide variety of contemporary situations, covering everything from design and siting, mixing, building walls, fireplaces, ovens and floors, lime and other natural finishes, and gaining planning permission and building regulation approval. It also explains in detail how to sensitively restore an old cob structure. This book is a step-by-step guide, lavishly illustrated with over 300 colour photos and 85 diagrams.
The Hand-Sculpted House
Are you ready for the Cob Cottage? This is a building method so old and so simple that it has been all but forgotten in the rush to synthetics. A cob cottage,cobb, however, might be the ultimate expression of ecological design, a structure so attuned to its surroundings that its creators refer to it as “”an ecstatic house.””
The authors build a house the way others create a natural garden. They use the oldest, most available materials imaginable–earth, clay, sand, straw, and water–and blend them to redefine the future (and past) of building. Cob (the word comes from an Old English root, meaning “”lump””) is a mixture of non-toxic, recyclable, and often free materials. Building with cob requires no forms, no cement, and no machinery of any kind. Builders actually sculpt their structures by hand.
Building with earth is nothing new to America; the oldest structures on the continent were built with adobe bricks. Adobe, however, has been geographically limited to the Southwest. The limits of cob are defined only by the builder’s imagination.
Cob offers answers regarding our role in Nature, family and society, about why we feel the ways that we do, about what’s missing in our lives. Cob comes as a revelation, a key to a saner world.
Cob has been a traditional building process for millennia in Europe, even in rainy and windy climates like the British Isles, where many cob buildings still serve as family homes after hundreds of years. The technique has newly arrived to the Americas, and, as with so many social trends, the early adopters are in the Pacific Northwest.
Cob houses (or cottages, since they are always efficiently small by American construction standards) are not only compatible with their surroundings, they ARE their surroundings, literally rising up from the earth. They are full of light, energy-efficient, and cozy, with curved walls and built-in, whimsical touches. They are delightful. They are ecstatic.
The Cob Builders Handbook
Are you ready for the Cob Cottage? This is a building method so old and so simple that it has been all but forgotten in the rush to synthetics. A cob cottage,cobb, however, might be the ultimate expression of ecological design, a structure so attuned to its surroundings that its creators refer to it as “”an ecstatic house.””The authors build a house the way others create a natural garden. They use the oldest, most available materials imaginable–earth, clay, sand, straw, and water–and blend them to redefine the future (and past) of building. Cob (the word comes from an Old English root, meaning “”lump””) is a mixture of non-toxic, recyclable, and often free materials. Building with cob requires no forms, no cement, and no machinery of any kind. Builders actually sculpt their structures by hand.
Building with earth is nothing new to America; the oldest structures on the continent were built with adobe bricks. Adobe, however, has been geographically limited to the Southwest. The limits of cob are defined only by the builder’s imagination.
Cob offers answers regarding our role in Nature, family and society, about why we feel the ways that we do, about what’s missing in our lives. Cob comes as a revelation, a key to a saner world.
Cob has been a traditional building process for millennia in Europe, even in rainy and windy climates like the British Isles, where many cob buildings still serve as family homes after hundreds of years. The technique has newly arrived to the Americas, and, as with so many social trends, the early adopters are in the Pacific Northwest.
Cob houses (or cottages, since they are always efficiently small by American construction standards) are not only compatible with their surroundings, they ARE their surroundings, literally rising up from the earth. They are full of light, energy-efficient, and cozy, with curved walls and built-in, whimsical touches. They are delightful. They are ecstatic.