Posts from — July 2009

Sabo – will work for food Jenny Sabo is a hard scrabble farmer and an eco-pioneer.  She believes soil health and sustainable farming is a national issue. She started Women of the Dirt , a group of farm-women across southwest Montana who share information on sustainable foods, gardening and livestock.

Farmers from all over the country now consult Women of the Dirt about sustainable farming practices.

“They are young, vivacious, very grounded people with a lot of technical capacity and personal passion,” 

I’ve been going back over the first pictures we took of our cabin, before it was renamed the sky castle, it’s hard to believe we have done so much with so little. Here are some of the original pix followed by more current pix. Enjoy!

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Sad but true General Electric is set to launch a household power generation kit this fall, that will both work together with the smart grid and be a home’s own internal smart grid – powering down the A/C on a cloudy day, for example, in a house dependent on solar panels sold in the same package.

GE, which for years supplied Hitler’s government with radar equipment, and at the end of the second world war proposed a continuing alliance between business and the military for “a permanent war economy,”  announced last week its vision of a home full of smart appliances that derive power from the house’s own solar panels, (more…)

Country Store where I work I know I haven’t written anything in a while, I have excuses though! ;) I’ve been sick, the gov is harassing me, my garden is calling… Well, they are all true, I’ll explain more in a future message, in the mean time, here is something fun I found on another blog and thought I’d post it here. (more…)

UK gov says power to the people The UK government has made off-grid thinking an integral part of the country’s energy policy with new grants available to any household or office that generates its own power.
The UK Low Carbon Transition Plan, unveiled yesterday by Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, charts exactly how the country will meet its legal commitment to cut carbon emissions by a third within eleven years. (more…)

Burn baby, burn The world’s largest “biochar”  eco-charcoal plant opens for business next month in Sequatchie County, Tennessee.

It is possible to make  biochar in your own garden  by simply digging a trench. Pile brush, wood, corn husks and other biomass into the trench and then light it. The fire needs to be hot at first but then has to be cooled down by reducing the oxygen supply.

Supporters say when dug into the soil it also enhances plant growth, increases water permeability, nutrient retention, fertility and improves root development. (more…)

Creekmore: neat and tidy Survivalist MD Creekmore used to be a a freelance handyman and part time gunsmith.  Now he’s a full time blogger, so he never has to leave home ‘cept to buy groceries and some more bullets .

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Big as Rhode Island Twentynine Palms facility, the largest US Marine Corps base, is to be transformed into a model smart microgrid system.

The vast  base in California houses the Marine Corps Combat Center, and already generates power on site to cover critical needs — with a solar plant as well as a fuel cell installation. The $2m project is being funded with Recovery Act money from the DOD’s Environmental Security Technology Certification Program. (more…)

Les Stroud: special needs We always thought Les Stroud was a total divit, and now it has been confirmed.

The self-regarding air-head who fronts the Survivorman series on Canadian TV recently gave this pompous interview to a Canadian outlet about his practices when travelling.

If you sit next to this guy on a plane- be warned – you will want to strangle him. (more…)