I am not sure if this belongs in science.Move if necessary I am planning on buying a small lot of land . I will be building a Mongolian yurt. The yurt is not completely sealed so I will be digging a mote around it to reduce the amount of spiders and vermin. It will be topped off with fish and surrounded by an array of perennial wild flowers .For heat the yurt will hove a wood burner inside. For electricity it will be powered by home made wind turbines, a fresnel lense and a stirling engine. I will have a solar shower out side made of a metal frame with a black plastic tarp ontop to hold and heat water , the sides draped with whitish clearish plastic. It will work with basic siphoning. There will be a veggie and herb/spice garden. A spice shack and an out house. Its a plan in development so there will probably be more. Buying wind turbines, solar panels, ect. can be very expensive but building the stuff your self is quite inexpensive and not difficult

Building wind turbine http://www.mdpub.com/Wind_Turbine/

A wonderful website on how to make and use a lot of green energy tools http://www.greenpowerscience.com/

Im not sure how well a yurt will hold up for permanent living. i am in the process of discussing this with the manufacturer. If they will not hold up I will be making something very similar http://www.mongolian-yurt.com/gallery.html

Awesome man. Instead of a yurt for your long term housing have you considered an Eco Dome? You could use the dirt from your mote!

Make sure to check out the video at the bottom of the page.

That's an admirable path you're taking. I wish you the best of luck with it.

What kind of climate will you be living in?

edit: straw bale/hemp block construction would be well worth considering. There are quite few innovative building methods would be much more durable than a yurt and may even work out cheaper. The yurt is after all designed for a nomadic lifestyle, so may not necessarily be the best choice if you're planning to stay put.

The climate is the east coast of the u.s. probably pa or nj. I have looked into strawbale construction before and I do consider after looking through this site. They use some kind of lime mixture to coat over the straw. http://www.simondale.net/house/build.htm

http://www.simondale.net/house/straw.htm

trapped moister inside of the bale worries me and I wonder how they get them dry enough that they will not rot.


It is so much work though.I can't drive to haul building materials because of my frequent seizures. I have to admit this step in my life is quite intimidating. I am 21 years old looking to get out on my own and live in harmony with the flow of natures being. It is a high objective to tackle at my age but I know my self as eternal infinite potential and I know I can do it. I just have to keep faith in my self to manifest my power of creation in this temporary physical world.

So you'll be in for some challenging temperatures in the winter months then - 20 below, or worse, with high probability of blizzard conditions. I imagine you'll have to be very well equipped for that.

You also state you can't drive, and that you suffer from an epileptic condition. That raises the question of how you'll manage to acquire the large quantities of food and fuel required to stay alive through such challenging conditions.

Do you have much experience of outdoors living? Will you have any help or support structure in this? Do you have a good amount of capital and free time to invest in becoming self-sufficient? Does the land have clean water and sewer drainage? Is it legally cleared for residential use?

yes winter can get harsh here. I do have an abundance of knowledge on wilderness survival.My father will most likely help me. I do not have a spotted out lot of land yet. In this time I am merely making the affirmation to direct my creative energy in what way I wish to manifest.

I like your plan, I am looking forward to following your progress.

Have you put any thought into digging down a couple of feet and putting your yurt over that?

Good luck! Sounds like a great idea to me.

IH

Did you already bought the property and which region are you looking at?

I'm in the same process of buying property to build my own ecologic holiday/semi permanent home. I selected 6 properties in Central Portugal from which I'll choose the coming weeks/months. Central Portugal has quite a few communities which support sustainable living and don't are too picky with regulations. I already visited an english/dutch family there which lives in a Yurt. Actually they have a system like you describe above. Wooden stove for heating, solar shower and solar power for electricity. They have all modern facilities like internet, hot-fill washing machine etc.
There is actually one property for sale in their area which already has a yurt and solar in place.

My plan is not to live in a yurt but either rebuild a ruin or build a house from scratch. It will be as independent as possible but will provide most modern standards which I'm used at home. It will be not totally isolated and have nearby neighbors at around 600-1000 meters. On two properties, the neighbors are like-minded people who also try to be as independent from facilities as possible with modern ways of living in mind.

2 solar collectors will provide hot water food 2 100 liter warm water reservoirs. Water will come from a borehole and pre filtered over sand. The hot water will not be filtered further and can be used to shower, washing and floor heating.
Energy supply will depend on the property. A wood stove will be use for cooking. It'll have a spiral in it which will provide additional heat for the warm water circuit.

There are two properties which have a year around stream on it. If possible legally I will install a 2KW water turbine to have steady power. There will be 16 180wp panels installed for a total maximum of around 3KW, backup batteries for power at night or cloudy days will be around 1000ah. The house will provide 12V power rails and 220V power rails. Devices will be 12V as much as possible. Internet will be provided by 2 way satellite as phone lines and 3g are too far away from all properties. Surprisingly two way satellite is very affordable nowadays.
Waste water will be filtered by an ecologic filter and recaptured in a large pond in which I will try to nurse fish.
Because I don't have the time yet to build everything myself, I'm going to buy solutions already on the market.

Also a cosy cabin will be placed on the property which will provide room for friends and family visiting during the summer months.
A large vegetable garden will provide some of the food and the trees already present will provide fruits, nuts and oil.

On either property (all more than 1 hectare) we made calculations for rebuilding, building from scratch with all technologies in place and it will be around 150K euro. My plan is too stay working in the Netherlands for 4-6 months a year and to live the remaining months in Portugal to cover expenses like insurance, taxes, food and unexpected costs. The past years I made savings to not needing a mortgage or loans. 20-60 euro flights from my hometown and a 1.5-2 hours drive from either Porto or Lisboa will make access ideal.

Already started to take language lessons for some time now (portugese and spanish). Help will come from friends and family. My dad already built an almost independent house in France, so he's quite experienced on the matter and very enthusiastic about my plans.

I'm really curious how your project is progressing and which challenges you face.