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GREEN ACRE/ HOLY SCRAP
An Off-Grid Hotel, Venue & Hot Springs Made of Reuse
Truth or Consequences, NM

In March of 06 my partner Mikey and I moved from New York City to Truth or Consequences NM to join a pioneering spirit that was emerging in a small western town. In September of 2006 we purchased an RV park and mineral hot spring in the downtown hot water district to convert into an off grid hotel, venue and hot spring gathering place. Our goal is to build with as much re-use as possible, carefully considering our carbon footprint along the way. When finished, it is our intention to offer workshops, entertainment, yoga and a variety of cultural events at our on site venue. Like a Sufi Khankah, we are building a place where home, spirit and community come together in a harmonious whole. We're still playing with names, but as of late we've gone by Green Acre and also Holy Scrap.

COMPONENTS

Rather than add to landfill and then require new building materials to build ourselves a home, we renovated a 40 year old mobile home that was the only structure on site. This took three months doing the work ourselves and working with one hired builder Jesse Servis. We hung new sheet rock and installed bamboo floors throughout. We tiled the baths (with throw away slightly damaged tile) and used a mass of old woods (found and donated) that we planed out to trim out the whole house. We made all our window treatments out of salt cedar used for curtain rods (an invasive plant that is local) with curtains made of hemp. We completed this project in January 2007 and moved in.

The final stage of this mobile home renovation is yet to come. We'll be covering the exterior of this home with paper crete, a mixture of 30% concrete to 70% recycled paper by weight. We will seal it with another paper crete mix (larger % concrete + lime and sand) for a stucco finish. In the end this will provide all of our insulation (as much as R 40) and will turn the 40 yr old mobile into a home with at least another 100 years of life.

PRIVACY WALL

We chose our new favorite material for the fence - paper crete - and we used our 8ft x 4ft x 5 inch slabs, attached to reused rail road ties and utility poles to create our fence. We completed this project in late summer of 2007.

NEW BUILDING (office, rooms for guests)

For new building (guests rooms and venue) we chose a combination of recycled shipping containers and ferro cement. With the insulative value of paper crete we'll be able to cover the exterior of shipping conatiners to bring the buildings up to R40 requiring very little additional power for heating and cooling. We already converted one to an office in which we put in bamboo floors and a door with a window. Ferro cement domes will be made for our guest rooms, these too will be filled with papercrete. We began construction of the first dome in autumn 2007.

RAINWATER HARVESTING & EARTH WORKS

All of our structures will deliver rain run off and greywater (from sinks, shower, washing machine) to native plants and vegitation. A paper crete cistern will capture back up water for irrigation. And we're working on a strategy for use of our hot mineral spring waters, a plan that can add additional uses for the water before it finds its way into the city drainage. The techniques and philosophy that we're following for this process is that of Brand Lancaster's who wrote several books on harvesting rainwater. Because our soil is sand with little organic matter, this autumn I'm growing a crop of rye to create bio mass.

POWER

To power our on site home in its entirety we have a 2000 watt solar set up consisting of twelve 170 watt panels. These will go up this autumn.

Stay in Touch!

If you'd like to subscribe to our mailing list and keep informed of new innovations and of course our opening to the public and events, please send a blank email to greenacre-subscribe@gaiatreehouse.com . And do check out the day to day building here at our blog

Many Thanks!
To the people who've worked with us so far: Jesse Servis, Jeremy Paskell, Fish, Smoke and our local community for their donations of paper!