Windcatcher Cooled Earthship for Hot Humid Climate with chance of tornados?

Hi to all,

I am considering a home build using Earthship design elements in a hot humid subtropical climate, about 40 " rain annually and a history of tornados.  I was additionally thinking of fish or meditation ponds catching the prevailing winds to blow through the major areas of the house for cooling, but the possibility of tornado strikes are very real in the region---if it werent for the high humidity Id consider earth sheltering around 4/5s of the house. I was thinking of  low profile wind catchers but are they then not like a hook to be ripped apart by tornado force winds?  Some ideas or references to other homes built in similar climates would be most appreciated.  Thanks

The tech answer are solar fans, but are pv direct and don't work at night.  I am still looking for an affordable solution that includes a battery and timer so it will run at 3-6 am and pre cool the building after the dew has dropped. And then run during the day after the temp rises or if the humidity is high.  There are hybrid attic fans that do that, but use 110 at night.

wind catchers will get ripped off in tornados or strong straight line winds, so you build them to break in a specific place that is cheap to fix and replace and not destroy the whole base.

What about building wind catchers that could close down when there is bad weather? Something like a wind gage that would close off the catcher at a predetermined speed. I have the same issues where I live with bad weather.

I feel I would go in a different direction.

Castles used to have towers so that the chimney effect would draw air from ground-level up and out the top, among other reasons. I am not suggesting you build a tower, though I want to (an observatory with a library, naturally). But I wonder if a chimney could be used to induce such a current.

It wouldn't need to be too tall, but if you painted it a dark colour, it would self-start. It could also be augmented with the aforementioned solar-powered electric fan setup.

If you are designing from scratch, you could literally have an earth-based cooling system just by locating properly critter-shielded vents in shaded, cool locations at or even beneath floor-level. The draw from the chimney starts (if it's a proper chimney, too, it might be wise to bypass the heating appliance by opening a cleanout port on the chimney by the ceiling, where warm air would gather), whether induced thermally or by the fan, and outside air, passing through whatever filters and critter barriers you've installed, is cooled by your buildings' thermal mass before entering the interior of your house at floor-level.

As to making windcatchers or other wind-power devices work in high-wind scenarios, my personal front-runner here, for ones that have moving parts, anyways, is the Vertical Axis Wind Turbine, and specifically, one capable of feathering its vanes automatically as windspeed increases. Past a certain point, they will fail, and as mentioned, the most cost-effective way to approach the situation is to make sure whatever breaks is cheap to fix. I would also favour a setup where the VAWTs could not only feather their vanes, but collapse them completely around their axis, leaving only thick posts exposed to the wind. A pin designed to shear off above a certain windspeed, with a designated fall path within a saddle socket, which would "lock" a fallen VAWT in the down position might be a good idea.

I also like the vibrating pole designs, as well as the arrays of vibrating bands within magnetic fields that are showing promise in the sphere of wind power generation. I do wonder about suitability at different windspeeds, though. The ability to change the angle of approach and feather the vanes is why I like VAWTs best.

-CK

I saw pictures of a house a while back where they had a foyer/space that was the highest point in the house, and at the top was a vent which was sort of a box that was black and facing south. A temp controlled system would open it to let hot air out, and it would then pull in outside air through long buried tubes. The vent didn't protrude much on the exterior, I believe it was a green roof and maybe it stuck up 1-2 feet from the surface like a glorified skylight. I believe the tubes were used in a passive annual heat storage system, heating the soil in summer and cooling the air, then in winter heating the smaller volume of air that came in with the system in cooler weather.

In tornado weather I'd be concerned about all the exterior glass damage, so long as you design for a safe space to avoid that I guess an earth-bermed structure would suffer less than a standard sick built house.

Thanks everybody for the design ideas, Im using these comments to design some comparative rough schematics.  And Mark, I was very much thinking along those same lines as your post this morning, underground conduits work for both heating and cooling. A friend emailed today me also with a solution ,  to protect large window spaces and be able to solidly close them. He suggested large sold concrete wheels or reinforced ceramic, which can be rolled into place with minimum energy to block the glass when bad weather is approaching. They could have a long "come along" lever attached to roll them.  I am for green rooves also, it seemed like errata to initially mention it, but Id like the house to be nearly invisible, and blend in with the surrounds woods as much as possible.  Thanks everybody, great ideas. More welcomed. Give me a bit and I will post some comparative schematics. Best..M