Monthly Archives: May 2011

Low-Tech

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In a culture where high-tech is synonymous with high-class, simple technology can seem irrelevant and outdated. After all, the low-tech lifestyle of horse-drawn carriages, weaving looms, and windmills hearkens back to an era predating our grandparents. Who wants to carry the stigma of appearing old-fashioned? Yet that desire to be modern — through new cars, computers, and televisions — has led to many social ills such as climate change, e-waste, and the obesity epidemic. Perhaps it’s high time to rethink high-tech.

The trouble with high-tech is that it prefers complicated solutions to simple ones. Take the problem of navigation, for example. Where a simple map and compass would do, high-tech prefers a GPS device instead. With the low-tech solution, all that’s needed is a piece of paper and a magnetized piece of iron. The high-tech device, however, requires batteries for power, integrated circuits for the computer, light-emitting diodes for the display, and hundreds of geosynchronous satellites for geolocation signals. Such sophistication, indeed, might come in handy for a truck driver or a mail carrier. But for the average commuter, the selling point of a GPS device is usually some minor convenience like voice navigation. How trivial, given high-tech’s record of wanton environmental destruction.

That pattern of environmental destruction is no accident. With high-tech products, wastefulness is built into the very design of its life-cycle. When a device requires electronics to manufacture, it is nearly impossible for an ordinary person to build it using scrap material. Any boy scout can print out a map using scratch paper and magnetize a compass made of scrap iron. Assembling your own TomTom — using only repurposed electronics, no less — is a superhuman feat (1).

So high-tech devices must always come from stores, which have little incentive to recycle. Repairs, when offered at all, are rare and expensive. That does not trouble shoppers as much as it should, since they have grown accustomed to devices that are not built to last. But will they ever grow accustomed to e-waste and landfills?

A pitiful trend emerges. Rather than empowering a person to solve his own problem, high-tech makes him dependent on outside infrastructure. A traveler must now rely on semiconductor factories, satellite networks, and coal power plants to figure out where he is. This forms the beginning of a vicious cycle: the more he uses his GPS, the quicker he forgets traditional navigation skills. Map illiteracy rates will rise, making GPS devices appear all the more essential. It is a likely situation, considering that only two centuries ago, our ancestors could navigate using stars alone.

Depending on a Rube-Goldberg machine is not cheap. Embedded in the price tag of every GPS device is the price of its specialized components: the processor, the LED display, the memory chips, the lithium-ion battery, the antenna, and the plastic surrounding the electronics. But the heaviest costs aren’t reflected in the price at all: they are passed on to future generations. Recycling e-waste is expensive, and no one wants to pay for the cleanup of space debris left by decomissioned satellites (2).

Alas, money can’t buy everything, especially not the infrastructure that high-tech demands. This is especially true in the backcountry, but even in the city, infrastructure can fail during an emergency. Satellite signals can grow weak, batteries can die, electronics can short-circuit, data can be erased, and GPS stores can close. When the infrastructure that sustains high-tech shuts down, so do the inventions. Modern technologies are not as robust as their primitive counterparts, so they simply stop working — often when needed the most.

It makes sense, then, to search for better technology — technology that is not highly complicated but rather highly appropriate. The ideal technology will be small in scale, easy to build, simple to fix, straightforward to recycle, low in cost, and highly reliable. This quest for appropriate technology, it turns out, often leads us back to the technology of our ancestors.

Besides, there’s no shame in being old fashioned. Horse-drawn buggies might draw unwanted attention, but other simple inventions, such as bicycles, vegetable gardens, and solar cookers, can even be stylish. You just need the will to get started — and maybe a little courage to deal with those curious neighbors and their impolite stares.

 

 

  1. Gpskit.nl teaches you how to build your own GPS using common hardware. The problem is that it’s difficult to recycle electronics.
  2. All those satellites produce a lot of space debris. Who will clean up all that floating garbage?
  3. Low-Tech Magazine has some great articles on low-tech inventions.
  4. Photo credit: Calsidyrose, CC BY.

Harness the Sun, Cheaply

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The photovoltaic panel isn’t the only hot technology under the sun. The solar cooker, a fuel-free alternative to the traditional stove, is another invention that can harness solar energy. While not as sophisticated as its photovoltaic cousin, the humble solar cooker is an important tool in sustainable development. It heats food by concentrating light onto a black pot using aluminum foil. Unlike a photovoltaic cell, a solar cooker requires neither rare earth metals nor integrated circuits. Its elegant simplicity makes it incredibly cheap to build. In fact, hand-made solar cookers are often made of ordinary junk lying around the house. But don’t let its modest, low-cost practicality fool you: solar cookers can reduce carbon emissions, protect forests, and enrich the poor.

To understand the value of the solar cooker, it’s important to grasp the drawbacks of a conventional stove. Every stove, whether it burns natural gas or firewood, requires fuel. Even an electric stove burns fuel, since electricity from the power grid comes from coal power plants. When fuel is burned, it generates carbon dioxide gas, which aggravates global warming. What’s worse, fuel often doesn’t burn cleanly. Incomplete combustion leads to smoke, which is made of particles that can irritate the lungs and eventually cause disease. The effects are worst for poor people cooking over fires with poor ventilation.

The price of the charcoal in the center is roughly the same price as any of the groups of food around it.

Overuse of cooking fuel leads to scarcity. Burning too much coal and natural gas depletes limited reserves, while burning too much firewood leads to deforestation. Fuel is also expensive, with the heaviest burden falling on the world’s ultra-poor. As much as half of a family’s income may be wasted on firewood alone. That income could have otherwise been invested in nutritious food, clean water, immunizations, and education. The world’s poor don’t have much money to burn.

The solar cooker provides an attractive solution. It runs entirely on clean, renewable solar energy. It produces no carbon emissions, requires no fuel, and saves one hundred percent of operating costs. Unlike with modern stoves, solar cookers can be built with common household items like cardboard, aluminum foil, glue, and a pair of scissors. A do-it-yourself version can be assembled in under an hour.

Solar cookers are based on simple principles. Light rays from the sun are not strong enough by themselves to cook food. Rays collected from a broad region, however, can be focused onto a small pot using reflective metal sheets to increase the delivered power. Pigments on a black pot absorb these light rays effectively to convert them into heat. On a hot day, a solar cooker can reach temperatures up to 165°C (330°F) — hot enough to boil, cook, and bake food.

The CooKit

The two essential components of a solar cooker are the pot and the reflective sheet metal. The ideal pot is black, since dark pigments work best for converting light rays into heat. White pots, or pots with shiny metal surfaces, do not work well because they reflect incoming light. The second component, the reflective sheet metal, is often aluminum foil because foil is cheap and widely available. The foil is glued onto a scaffold (often cardboard, sometimes an umbrella) so that it can help concentrate light rays onto the pot. Variations in design center around the arrangement of aluminum foil and the type of insulation the solar cooker uses.

Two styles of solar cookers are very popular: a box-style solar oven and a panel-style cooker. In a solar oven, the pot is insulated by durable oven walls lined with a reflective aluminum interior. Any heat-resistant scrap material, like bricks or fodder, can be used for insulation. By trapping in heat, a solar oven can maintain a uniform temperature and continue cooking for a few hours after sunset. A panel-style cooker, on the other hand, resembles a traditional stove. It only uses a thin plastic bag for insulation, but it has a large reflective surface that can capture plenty of light. Design plans for both styles are available free online. You can either buy one professionally made, or build one from scratch at no cost. Anyone up for a fun weekend project?

A box-style cooker (left) and a panel-style solar cooker (right)

One drawback of the solar cooker is that it heats more slowly than a conventional stove. With a solar cooker, meals take longer to cook and require advance preparation. The CooKit model, for example, requires double the heating time and has a maximum temperature of 120°C. This minor nuisance, however, actually provides unintended benefits. A steady, low-heat simplifies cooking since food cannot burn at 120°C. Once set up, cooking a meal requires no extra stirring or monitoring. There’s also less chance to start a fire.

Alas, there is another caveat: a solar cooker will not work in the dark. Extra insulation can help on overcast days, but don’t expect it to work during a blizzard. Because of this limitation, a solar cooker cannot fully substitute for a conventional stove. On sunny days, however, solar cookers are still the most cost-effective, light-impact cooking technology available.

Solar cookers have much to offer to the world’s poor. Solar Cookers International, the non-profit organization behind the CooKit, has distributed over 30,000 solar cookers in Africa. To help Darfuri women, it donated 10,000 CooKits to a refugee camp in Chad. Not only did these cookers help save fuel expenses, they also allowed women to prepare food without the need to venture outside camp, which reduced their risk of assault while attempting to gather firewood.

An umbrella solar cooker

Solar cookers, however, have been largely ignored in the West. It’s a pity — they are a must-have for the ultralight Greenimalist. They can be built from leftover scrap (cardboard and aluminum) and they use free sunlight as fuel. Panel-style cookers also fold well for easy traveling. What’s more, solar cookers work off-grid, making them useful in campgrounds and homesteads.

One final note: solar cooker operators should wear sunglasses to protect themselves from UV damage. All those concentrating beams aren’t so good for your eyes when you stare at them directly. Then again, wearing a stylish pair of shades might not be such a bad thing, especially if corrugated cardboard and aluminum foil isn’t your idea of green chic.

  1. Photo credits: Tom Sponheim, public domain. Tom Sponheim, CC BY-SA. Tom Sponheim, public domain. Xuaxo, CC BY-SA. rangorang, CC BY-NC-ND. Meganhelms, CC BY-SA.

Becoming Self Sufficient

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Self-sufficiency is about taking care of your basic needs all by yourself. As with any lifestyle, there’s a broad spectrum of what it means to be self-sufficient. Some people are content to simply grow their own vegetables and cook their meals from scratch. Others generate their own electricity, collect their own rainwater, and live without gasoline. The totally self-sufficient person, however, can survive entirely apart from human civilization. He does everything himself, from building his own shelter to making his own furniture to growing his own wheat.

The path to self-sufficiency can be broken down into five major categories:

  1. Shelter — Shelter can range anywhere from a primitive teepee to a rustic log cabin to a two-story house to a luxury mansion. Most homesteaders buy land to construct their house on. Some will build their own houses with local materials such as wood or clay, whereas others contract the work out to professionals. Ultimately, the luxury and comfort-level of your shelter depends on your expertise, effort, and budget.
  2. Energy — This includes all the energy you’ll need for cooking, heating water, lighting, powering appliances, and heating and cooling. Energy solutions range from high-tech photovoltaic cells and biodiesel-powered electric generators to low-tech solar-cookers and firewood (1).
  3. Food — You can forage, hunt, or grow your own food (2). If you don’t own any land, community gardens are a great way to start your first vegetable garden (3). However, for those who desire total self-sufficiency, there’s no substitute for owning your own property. With your own land, you can grow fruit trees and staple crops like wheat, potatoes, and rice. You could even raise your own livestock for meat and milk (4).
  4. Water — You’ll need to collect your own water for drinking, cooking, hygiene, and possibly irrigation. In moist climates, rain catchment systems can provide enough drinking water for the entire year (5). You can also drill wells to tap into groundwater. You’ll probably need a water purification system and a system to treat sewage. Your set-up can include luxurious indoor plumbing for sinks, showers, and toilets; or, you can build a sustainable composting toilet and collect rainwater with a simple barrel.
  5. Transportation — Self-sufficiency does not imply isolation. You’ll still want to meet with other people, so consider walking, riding a bike, taking public transit, or producing biodiesel for your car (1).

Self-sufficiency is simply a guiding principle, so your own execution will vary depending on what best fits you. Most modern homesteaders aren’t totally self-sufficient: many of them own cars, shop for clothes, and use satellite internet. You can include modern technology if it makes the transition more enjoyable. Homesteaders today often own laptops, refrigerators, and photovoltaic solar panels. Many of them even hold regular jobs while living full-time in the woods.

Why have so many people opted to live the self-sufficient life? Besides enjoying the romantic, pastoral lifestyle, there are plenty of practical benefits for being self-sufficient. Here are just a few:

  • You’ll pollute less. By being self-sufficient, you’ll learn to compost food scraps, grow your own organic food, build with local materials, generate renewable energy, and avoid shopping. Each step makes a difference towards lowering your environmental impact.

  • You’ll save lots of money. Imagine if you didn’t have any more expenses: no more car payments, no more auto insurance, no more utility bills, and free food and housing. If you practice extreme self-sufficiency, you could literally live without any money.

    You don’t need to do everything yourself, nor do you need to quit your job. If gardening is too much hassle, for example, you could always buy produce from the farmers market. Likewise, it may be prudent to keep your job to help build savings. However, the more self-sufficient you become, the more you’ll save, and the fewer financial obligations you’ll have. Every little bit of self-sufficient frugality can increase your freedom.

  • You’ll pay off your debts quickly. If you work full-time in addition to homesteading, you’ll have an income with virtually no expenses. Undeveloped land is cheap, so you can often purchase it without a mortgage. After a few short years of hard work, you’ll own a house debt-free. A self-sufficient homestead can provide freedom from the turbulent state of the economy. After all, wouldn’t you rather spend your mornings gathering firewood than worrying about loan payments?

  • You’ll be more independent. Once you learn self-sufficiency skills, you’ll no longer depend on modern conveniences like restaurants, department stores, and gas stations. You’ll also no longer need the utilities company for water and power. Not only is self-sufficiency convenient, it could save your life during an emergency. During a serious crisis, such as a hurricane, earthquake, or a terrorist attack, you might be left stranded for weeks without basic necessities. By being self-sufficient today, your family will be much better prepared for future emergencies.

  • You’ll learn to be more resourceful. Many of us today can’t survive without cappuccinos and WiFi internet, let alone life in the rural countryside. But if you’ve ever wanted to explore different parts of the world or buy back-country property, it helps to learn self-sufficiency skills. As a benefit, the cost of living will be far cheaper. You can combine this with a telecommuting job to build savings.

  • You’ll enjoy the learning experience (hopefully). As you become self-sufficient, you’ll acquire practical skills that teach you about the environment and sustainable development. Up until the last century, these primitive skills were mostly common knowledge; we’re merely re-learning them today. This knowledge can help us better understand both historical cultures and the world around us.

Self-sufficiency is a fusion of many related ideas. It’s half low-cost lifestyle and part do-it-yourself ingenuity, mixed in with sustainable development and a touch of emergency preparedness. Really, it can be a lot of fun.

There are plenty of books available on self-sufficient living online, with much of it totally free. Not surprisingly, self-sufficient living hasn’t changed much in the last two hundred years. As a result, there are many useful books that have fallen into the public domain. There are also many e-books that have been donated by governments and NGOs to help the developing world. Today, we literally have thousands of books at our very fingertips.

Here are some books that have made it into my summer reading list:

Paid:

Free:

  1. Learn to make your own biodiesel and build your own solar cooker. Biodiesel is only green if you grow your own crops using no outside energy inputs. Biodiesel produced from biomass raised in conventional farms might be worse than gasoline.
  2. The US Army Survival Handbook teaches you how to hunt and forage wild foods. Just make sure to follow your community’s local laws!
  3. Search for a community garden near you!
  4. The Backyard Homestead provides a gentle introduction for newcomers. You’ll learn to grow and cooking your own food.
  5. Catching rainwater is quite simple, really.
  6. Photo credits: anoldent, CC BY-SA. Hardworkinghippy, CC BY-SA.