In the spirit of the famous line from The Graduate ("One word -- are you listening? -- one word: plastics.") the new one-word is "water." I thought of it again this morning when watching a tour of the Bush ranch house in Crawford, Texas, highlighting some of its eco-friendly design. According to Laura Bush:
•No gutters. All rainwater runs off the tin roof into stone-filled troughs that surround the house, which funnel the water into a 44,000 gallon underground cistern for later irrigation use.
•Geo-thermal heating; possible windmill coming.
Additional specs on the house (gray- and black-water cisterns; all-stone construction using scrap stone; house design [a long thin house; few interior doors] that facilitates air-flow for cooling) can be found in this article.
The water issue is likely not to go away based on what I read. My son Daniel wrangled a bunch of 55-gallon food-grade plastic drums from a food company in his hometown and has set several up in his yard to catch and store rainwater from the gutters for irrigating their garden -- and has passed on some of the barrels to friends who want to do the same. He gave me one and I am trying to collect the parts needed to install spigots, etc., as is he. This is a simple step that lots of us could do to re-use rainwater. And your plants will thank you for not slaking their thirst with the likes of chlorine, fluoride, and the other chemicals in city water.
•No gutters. All rainwater runs off the tin roof into stone-filled troughs that surround the house, which funnel the water into a 44,000 gallon underground cistern for later irrigation use.
•Geo-thermal heating; possible windmill coming.
Additional specs on the house (gray- and black-water cisterns; all-stone construction using scrap stone; house design [a long thin house; few interior doors] that facilitates air-flow for cooling) can be found in this article.
The water issue is likely not to go away based on what I read. My son Daniel wrangled a bunch of 55-gallon food-grade plastic drums from a food company in his hometown and has set several up in his yard to catch and store rainwater from the gutters for irrigating their garden -- and has passed on some of the barrels to friends who want to do the same. He gave me one and I am trying to collect the parts needed to install spigots, etc., as is he. This is a simple step that lots of us could do to re-use rainwater. And your plants will thank you for not slaking their thirst with the likes of chlorine, fluoride, and the other chemicals in city water.
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