Flying Only with the Heat of the Sun

July 24, 2021 by Francis Rogers Filed Under: Airships, Aviation, Balloons, Random

If you picture a flying machine, you probably imagine a craft which is heavier than air, somehow kept aloft with wings or propellers. Heavier-than-air flight dominates discourses about aviation. “Sustainable” crafts are designed to be as light as possible (whilst remaining heavier than air), so that they require less energy from whatever renewable source they use for lift. These machines include human-powered planes such as those using pedals to rotate a propeller. Lighter still are kites and gliders, which remain heavier than air, but rely on air resistance and lighter air around them to fly.

Less discussed are flying machines which are lighter than the air they fly through because the weight of their materials and passengers is counterbalanced by the hot air or light gases they contain. [1] Perhaps this is because most of us experience flight in passenger airliners, not Zeppelins. In theory, making lighter-than-air flight sustainable is simple: heat a container full of air with sunlight so that it rises. In January 2020, Leticia Noemi Marqués flew freely in the Aerocene Pacha solar balloon, the first Fédération Aéronautique Internationale certified fully-solar, untethered, manned flight. Previous flights of this kind went uncertified or relied on propane burners or inflation generators [2]. Aerocene Pacha flies on solar energy not from solar panels or batteries but absorbed directly in the envelope (the fabric of the balloon). [Read more…]

Remaking Suburbia

July 21, 2021 by kris de decker Filed Under: Cities, DIY, Random

Quoted from: Trainer, Ted. “Remaking settlements for sustainability: the Simpler Way.” Journal of Political Ecology 26.1 (2019): 202-223.

In view of the global resource and ecological situation, per-capita resource consumption rates in the rich world probably need to be reduced by 90%. This can only be done if there is a “de-growth” transition to some kind of Simpler Way centered on mostly small, highly self-sufficient and self-governing communities in control of local economies within a culture that is not focused on material wealth.

It is not surprising that the viability of such a vision is typically regarded as implausible. The aim of this study is to show that normal outer city suburbs could be restructured along the lines required to cut global impacts by the necessary amount, while improving the quality of life. Data on typical Australian consumption rates, food production yields, suburban geographies, etc. is used to estimate the achievable reductions.

The theoretical conclusion that such reductions could be made aligns with a study of the Dancing Rabbit Eco-village in northeast Missouri. Heavy cuts in resource consumption cannot be made without extreme change in economic, political, settlement and cultural systems.

The Chukudu is a cargo scooter built entirely from wood

July 19, 2021 by kris de decker Filed Under: Cargo, Low-tech cars, Random, Travel

Image: Lahminewski Lab, CC BY-SA 4.0.

From the Wikipedia page, which summarizes and links to all sources that are available online:

The chukudu is a two-wheeled handmade vehicle used in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is made of wood, and is used for transporting cargo. The chukudu generally has an angular frame, two small wheels (often of wood, sometimes wrapped with rubber), handlebars, and a pad for the operator to place their knee on while propelling the vehicle with their leg. On a descent, the rider stands on the deck like a kick scooter. On flat ground, the rider can put one knee on the deck and push the ground by the other foot like a knee scooter. Rubber mud flaps and shock absorber springs may be added.

In Goma, where chukudus form the “backbone of the local transportation system”, chukudus are made of hard mumba wood and eucalyptus wood, with scrap tires for wheel treads. These chukudus take one to three days to build, and last two to three years. The most commonly used size is about six and one half feet long, and carries a load of 1000 lbs. However, the largest chukudus can carry up to 800 kilograms of weight.

A small chukudu can be built in about three hours, using dimensional lumber and materials available in a hardware store. The chukudu is customizable to carry different types of cargo. To haul firewood some chukudus have a hole drilled in the middle of the sitting deck, and the operator can insert a stick to hold firewood in place. Others have a large basket to carry various loads.

Chukudus image colection.

DIY.

Thanks to Spencer Cappallo.

We believe in Science

July 9, 2021 by kris de decker Filed Under: Health, Random

Theoretically, science is the contrary of religion because, while the latter is dogmatic, science should be anti-dogmatic, based on rationality and on an objective and empirical methodology. However,… science contributes to create the cultural system whereby we live and that gives meaning to our reality, which is based on some basic assumptions/beliefs: our “faith”.

The core of science has embodied the heritage of Christianity and Hebraism and, in a different way, could be practiced as a religion from many people. For western religions, the past was evil, the present redemption and future heaven. For science the past is ignorance/superstition, the present consists of progress using the tools of science, and the future consists in the positivistic promise of a sort of heaven in the real world.

Quoted from: Aillon, J. L., and M. Cardito. “Health and Degrowth in times of Pandemic.” Visions for Sustainability 14 (2020): 3-23.

Full issue of the magazine (Health and Degrowth Special).

Image by Kārlis Dambrāns – Mobile World Congress 2018, CC BY 2.0.

Drying clothes near the ceiling

July 9, 2021 by Francis Rogers Filed Under: Clothes, Laundry, Random

“It’s winter in northern Europe, and there’s no electricity. How can you dry your laundry? One of the best places of all is a laundry room in the servants’ quarters of a mansion house. A generous ceiling height means you can have frames for wet clothes and household linen in the warmest, dryest part of the room. The estate handyman would make them, and by the later 19th century he would probably add ropes and a pulley to raise and lower the rack. No need to climb on a chair to hang laundry.”

Read more: Drying clothes near the ceiling, HomeThingsPast.

How to Build a Small Town in Texas

July 7, 2021 by kris de decker Filed Under: Cities, DIY, Random

“Of all the questions I get on Twitter the most common is this: ‘How do you build a town?’ We know well how it used to be done, but these last one or two centuries we have forgotten how to do it (with only a handful of notable exceptions during the last century).

The other day I was asked again, but this time with a set of premises that made the question a little easier to approach. I have anonymized all the details but the general idea remains: four guys (friends) with money have bought a suitably large piece of land in Texas and now want to create a car-free human-scaled town of the kind that I am always writing about.

In this text I intend to set out the most bare-bone basic premises for how to start a good town, what is needed to build something anti-fragile and sustainable under the above mentioned scenario.”

Read more: How to Build a Small Town in Texas, Wrath of Gnon, July 2021. [Read more…]