futu

reNow Community Building

b y M i k e U p s t o n e

The picture may

seem futuristic to

some but the

solutions described in

this article all exist,

strangely no-one

seems to have put

them all together in

one place... yet.

The community of the future is here already, it takes many forms

and many materials and tools are available to build such a community in a state-of-the-art format. Here in Norway we are intent on integrating many of these elements for the first time at the Solem community about an hour North of Trondheim by car. When it comes to our housing needs there are no potential solutions off the table but we certainly expect to be able to put together straw bale houses with 10 people in under 10 days. There is nothing of particular note about that actually - however our houses will be coated with a mixture of naturally occurring magnesium oxide, clay, ash and animal dung. The result will be a 'geopolymer' many times stronger than steel, radiation proof, paramagnetic (countering EMF), positive for the environment and a highly beneficial for the people living within it.

MgO, its chemical formula, forms a single crystalline structure within an hour or so of mixing, so it makes the perfect multi-pour product for building and the crystal structure it forms means it offers particularly intriguing options for anyone wishing to live in a house employing sacred geometry. MgO can be used on roads as well as houses, a particular issue here as concrete and tarmac roads need regular rebuilding after the harsh winter and subsequent thaw. MgO is far superior to cement in pretty much every way, so much so that China will be banning concrete this year in favour of this material which was used to build their temples and even the Great Wall of

China, thousands of years ago. When restoring their temples 2-3,000 years old, it was discovered that the wood and straw cellulitic material was in perfect condition underneath. The low cost, fast build characteristics and extreme longevity mean it's pretty hard to beat as a value for money building material.

MgO can be manufactured from the commonly occurring magnesite mineral, or from seawater and the production process uses a fraction of the energy of cement – as a natural material it

does not give off harmful gasses if exposed to water, unlike concrete and is non-polluting for the planet, in fact it is even used as a natural plant supplement. It's only one of a class of materials known as geopolymers, which form such perfect and powerful bonds that they are used for the manufacture of Russian nuclear submarine hulls and as the Ukrainians discovered at Chernobyl, they repel radiation – as a result they are also used for encapsulating the most toxic products on the planet.

One of our early projects will be to use MgO to produce a straw bale barn, straw bale having excellent thermal properties, being virtually fireproof (not that that will be an issue with a material like MgO which has a melting point of several thousand degrees), earthquake and hurricane proof, provided it is anchored correctly - the main risk is not destruction but being lifted away if winds are exceptional... It has happened, several years ago a non-MgO straw bale barn in tornado alley was carried a couple of hundred yards before being rotated and redeposited in one piece. Inside our growing barn we intend to use a combination of hydroponic (water culture) and aquaponic (fish culture) fruit and vegetable growing systems.

Photo by Severin.stalder/CC 3.0

A key issue here is the long, harsh winter, where temperatures regularly drop to 20 or 30 below and there are only a few hours of light each day, so we will be testing compost as a primary heating source - a well designed compost heap gets up to over 50 degrees within a coup le o f days – and we w i l l be supplementing the heat as required.

The compost product will be used on our outdoor permaculture projects, enabling us to use techniques as shown in the well-known Back to Eden film; a process that employs newspaper with wood chips and compost. This naturally reduces weeding, watering, makes planting and harvesting easier, eliminates digging and reduces the impact of pests. It also facilitates far greater productivity as well as saving hundreds of hours of back breaking labour each year and it will enable us to grow crops suited to alkaline soil next to the ones better suited to the local acid soil conditions.

One of the indoor growing systems we will be appraising is the

Volksgarden, an ingenious rotating drum system of 48” in diameter – think of the inside of

a washing machine – this has a light at the centre of the spindle and a bath for feeding and watering the plants in the base unit, which also powers the rotation cycle. The plants are slid into the drum on trays and because the rotation means the plants are effectively growing in zero gravity conditions, the result is accelerated growth and fruition, tomatoes fruit in around 30 days compared to 90. In practical terms this also helps to save the environment. In combination with our other technologies (energised water, Calcium Carbonate spraying) and by stacking the machines we expect to grow at least 20 times the food in the same space compared to growing outdoors and to benefit from organic fish, fruit and veg all year round, with next to no manual input except for daily harvesting and periodic replanting.

Once we've appraised the results of this first experiment we are already considering making a second compartment to our growing barn or building a second barn to create a heated tropical growing area. Our ambition is to have the best food in Norway – no ifs or buts - absolutely fresh organic produce every day of the year and not limited to local produce, so our ambition extends to pomegranates, guava, pineapples, star fruit, figs, avocados, citrus fruits, papaya and even dwarf banana trees. Any items not covered by our in-house food production should be tradable, as the intention is not just self sufficiency but the creation of abundance and unmatched quality that can be sold, traded, preserved, or donated to members of the local community. All of this will save transport and distribution costs, packaging and trips to the local supermarkets for highly priced organic food that has typically been picked days beforehand, unripe or beginning to rot and wrapped in plastic – resulting in poor quality, waste and pollution.

Year Around

The next element in our concept invo lves the pur i f i ca t ion and energization of water. It may be surprising but lack of water can be an issue even in a country replete with lakes and rivers, especially if you are 400m up a local hill. The nearest water is 30m or more below us, requiring the use of wells, but water is often short and currently needs to be treated carefully. By harvesting it from rooftops we will have plenty more, in which case it will need to be purified and energised. Energization is a process using technology like Dan Winter's Vortex Imploder, recently tested by friends at Auroville in waste removal and by Dan and his team in the greening the desert project in Dubai. The result of energisation is far faster cleansing of waste, coupled with greater water efficiency through increased plant growth. The result Dan and his team achieved in the desert, when coupled with biochar, compost and mineral supplements was plant growth within weeks and on relatively low amounts of water, treated by his Schauberger-inspired magnetic vortex system.

Our intent is to ensure the water we put back into the environment is as clean if not cleaner than the water we take from it and our own water is of excellent quality and subject to no future restrictions or limitations. On this basis we will harvest rainwater for our personal use as well as our gardening projects.

When it comes to waste our self reliance on home grown produce will mean we can virtually eliminate use of plastics and anything else that is 'donated' from the local supermarkets. On top of this we will be implementing systems to either use urine waste for plant fertiliser (by diluting it 10:1 with water), or growing algae from it which can feed the aquaponic fish, be turned into compost, or used as biochar. The solid waste will again be used productively in the form of output from composting toilets.

"Water is the life blood of the earth. When water is healthy it has a complex structure that enables it to communicate information, carry energy, nutrients and healing, to self-cleanse and discharge wastes."    ~Viktor Schauberger, Forester, Naturalist and Water Visionary

Energized Water

EXCERPT FROM “BREAKTHROUGH POWER BY JEANE MANNING , AS SEEN IN SCIENCE TO SAGE MAGAZINE

The current heating system here

burns wood and also the communal rubbish – not the ideal solution for an eco community, but the norm in Norway for farm dwellings. This at least is converted to heat and stored via a hot water tank before being pumped under the floors of the houses. Many 'free' or pure energy systems are now poised to enter the market and the products available such as wind or solar power are already exponentially better than most commercial solutions, which are based on old and very inefficient technology. We expect magnetic motors, papp engines, hydroxy (hydrogen and oxygen from water) to begin to make market inroads from all directions. If we focus on the relatively mundane solar and wind solutions, the state-of-the-art options can be combined with the best in class step up generation and storage to optimise effectiveness and efficiency along the entire energy value chain.

When it comes to health care we

again intend to use little known but highly advanced technologies including the low level laser, Scenar and Cosmodic energy healing devices and healing blankets, developed for the Russian space programme. We already harvest usnea, the potent antiviral, antibacterial and antifungal lichen, which here in Norway literally does grow on trees and is also known as 'old mans beard'. This 1,600+ year old immune boosting cure used in Traditional Chinese Medicine for many ills and it can also be used to treat the fish we intend to cultivate in the aquaponics project, we will close the loop as the waste water from the fish will be subsequently fed to the indoor plants by our aquaponic system.

http://camdenaquaponicsproject.com/

Maa-Bara: Catalyzing Economic Change & Food Security by Designing Decentralized Aquaponics Productionhttp://maabara.org

Aquaponics

That's our list so far – and yes - we expect it all, the very best of old and new... why not? Our intent is to live in a b u n d a n c e b y i n t e g r a t i n g a n d manifesting the best solutions and options, linking them all together to show the world how it can (and perhaps many will agree should) be done. Our intention is to create a holistic model, based on nature and human nature, a Bucky Fuller style approach, which continually evolves through conscious feedback while remaining stable and focused on its intent. Along the way we intend to create a win-win-win, for ourselves, other men, women and children and our planet... we invite you to share it with us.

Mike Upstone founded the Universal Trust in 2012, an organisation dedicated to help to produce and promote positive solutions for the p l a n e t : m a r r y i n g a d v a n c e d t e c h n o l o g y w i t h w e l l - p r o v e n principles of sustainability, self governance and freedom for all.

YOU-TubeWin, Win, Winning2013 GlobalBEM Presentation

Mike Upstone