Terry Byrne

Hi Lisa.

I have abandoned the Hait idea as it is such a massive undertaking. There is a similar idea that has been done, successfully, in Okotoks, Alberta, Canada called Drake Landing Solar Community. I'll let you read about it at the link below.

Having viewed your weather info, [see Ireland weather chart below] you easily could supply virtually all heat needed with passive solar using a R2000 type Super Energy Efficient Build.

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Welcome to Drake Landing Solar Community.  

The Drake Landing Solar Community (DLSC) is a master planned neighbourhood in the Town of Okotoks, Alberta, Canada that has successfully integrated Canadian energy efficient technologies with a renewable, unlimited energy source - the sun.

The first of its kind in North America, DLSC is heated by a district system designed to store abundant solar energy underground during the summer months and distribute the energy to each home for space heating needs during winter months.

http://www.dlsc.ca/
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But as you and I are not going to attract a huge community around our own projects, we need a smaller scale idea and that too has come out of this larger project.

You mention lots of water where you are. Do you get sustained freezing temps in winter, does the water, ponds, lakes and the like freeze solid? What are your January temps, night time lows, day time highs?

An engineering department at an Ontario university has scaled this down for single family dwellings. The Drake Landing solar collection and storage is huge and this idea does not scale down well, ie. efficiently for single family homes.

I'll locate the above and post later.

So instead of using the Earth for a heat storage medium, a buried, super insulated water tank, concrete I think, stores the heat collected thru the hot months for delivery in the cold months. Now remember, Canada is butt cold, whereas your heating demands would be much lower. The houses are insulated to a very high standard and uncontrolled air infiltration is effectively zero, with air to air heat exchangers used to ensure a warmed/recycled air exchange.

My initial thinking is that your climate is VERY conducive to creating a super energy efficient dwelling that would have a very low energy load [compared to Canada, northern usa, ... ] and so would require minimal heating.
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What is the temperature of Ireland by month?
Temperature:
January 5°C/ 41 °F 5°C/ 41 °F
April 8°C/ 46 °F 11°C/52 °F
July 15°C/ 59°F 14°C/57 °F
October 10°C/ 50°F 7°C/44.6 °F
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Creating large energy resources is expensive, it also has equipment requiring maintenance, replacement costs while creating a super energy efficient house can last a lifetime.

If your area of Ireland is anything like the above chart I copied off the internet, you can supply a large fraction of needed heat in an R2000 super insulated, recycled air with an air to air heat exchanger style home.

Check out the link below. Then we can talk more when you supply info as to your heating requirements as requested above.

Details of the R-2000 Standard

https://natural-resources.canada.ca/energy-efficiency/homes/professional-opportunities/become-energy-efficient-builder/details-the-r-2000-standard/20588

calbo collier wrote:I wonder if this is what you are after Terry:

"Farming with Nature", "Aquaculture", "Terraces and Raised Beds"  ?

https://vimeo.com/ondemand/seppholzerspermaculture

Those are the three films, Calbo, thank you berry berry much!!  Now, I thought I bought them a few years ago.

terry

Hi All,

I am excited to see the new Sepp Holzer movie. Could anyone tell me the name of the first three videos of Sepp? I bought them from either Permies way back when or from Sepp Holtzer online. I think that they may be on my computer.

Thanks muchly.

Beau Davidson wrote:

Terry Byrne wrote:Just a quick question. Does HD Streaming mean that said individual gets to watch the movie one time, as if one went to a movie theater?

Terry

Nope, if you get the HD Streaming, you get to watch it over and over as much as you want.

Thanks berry berry much, Beau!!

Just a quick question. Does HD Streaming mean that said individual gets to watch the movie one time, as if one went to a movie theater?

Terry

bogdan smith wrote:Oak kitchen

GORGEOUS!!! Real cup boards.

Tom Moran wrote:Greetings. I’m currently building an addition to our 20+ year old straw bale home. Since I’m a thrifty type, most everything is DIY. I’ve buried the PERT tubing in the floor, now having to copy a commercial radiant heat control panel. It looks easy enough and I can build the similar commercial $3k panel for less than $1 k in parts. I can solder.
I’m looking for input on whether my proposed design makes sense; it’ll be powered by a new rinnai lp tankless water heater, feeding (eventually) 4 zones via zone valves. I’ll try to add my schematic below.
Any input appreciated. Thanks. Tom

I did a huge whole house radiant floor heating system many many many moons ago. Two floors plus a garage and basement. The latter two had buried in concrete tubing and the house portion, two floors, had the tubing attached to the underside of the plywood floor in a normal wood framed house.

Make your outflow and the return headers for the 4 zones now with the shut off valves/zone valves, etc attached and whatever type of connection you are using, going to use be it barbed, solder, ... so all you have to do later is attach the new feed lines for any new zone you add and of course the return lines so you won't have to shut down the whole system when adding new zones.

One big mistake I made was not allowing for expansion of the concrete floors. Use an [obviously] stay in place compressible form "board" where you are doing a concrete floor pour. Or you will end up with cracked/heaved concrete.

Also stay away from carpeting as it is "fabulous insulation" and it doesn't allow for easy movement of heat to people.

It has been so long that I can't remember the names of the various plumbing fittings though I can see the whole thing in my mind. In those days I think I used Poly B but not even sure on that.