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This idea is long term and unlikely to meet fruition, however I would like to get my ideas down here any way.
This used to be a very different idea, but through a few iterations, it moved into the realm of feasible.


After I have experiance with the Earthship and hopefully after I have put some money aside, I would like to buy a large chunk of land (because this will not be my primary residencce, it does not have to be in Michigan) and start developing it for a community setting. The goal would be to create a place for people to learn about this type of lifestyle. Someplace that they could live for free and learn about the systems.
== Core Concept ==
Dorms for adults. Every unit is comprised of some number of room and bathrooms. Rooms are all 12x12. The smallest (and most common) unit is 2 rooms, one bath. The idea that and individual or couple has a bedroom and a sitting room. Rent include food and access to facilities (laundry, small kitchen, etc.). For a little more, it includes services, basic housekeeping and a gardener (the units use grey water reclamation, so they all have a small indoor garden.


== Principles ==
To manage and expand this will require a whole business, several actually. House keeping, kitchen, construction and utilities. From there, it makes sense to extend kitchen to farming/gardening to bring down the price of fresh fruit and vegetables. And construction can extend to wood working and lumber.


=== What we Are ===
== Layout ==
* Focused on Learning
The main section will only be an acre or two. Some number of units plus all the support buildings. More area will be taken up by gardens and farms. Beyond that, a huge area will be taken up by forests. The forests are mainly to provide lumber, but they can incorporate permaculture to provide food as well.
* A Community (health research about belonging to community)
* Secular


=== What we Are Not ===
== Employment ==
* A Cult (keep your money, you can leave any time)
The idea is that most people involved both live and work here. It's not a requirement (either direction) but it's the goal. In order for that to be sustainable, there must be exports. Based on the requirements above, the two most logical exports are food and wood products. Both can range from raw to processed goods.
* A "return to simplicity", we will use technology as it suits us, though we value self-sufficiency, it is not to the exclusion of other values


== Gardens ==
== The Maths ==
I've used the calculation that a person needs about 1sqft of garden per meal. So 150*3*365 = 164,250sqft of garden space.
The question is how many people do we need in order to make something sustainable.


=== Buildings ===
=== Lumber ===
A sustainable forest can produce about [http://affluentpeasant.barkie.net/forest/susyield.htm 1/2 cord/year]. The heart wood can be used for lumber products, the rest can be used in a variety of other ways - composted, wood chips or burned to heat water or produce electricity.


==== Basic Homes ====
There are several relevant formulas here that need variables filled in. What is the maximum useable lumber production per acre*year? At that level, how much secondary (burnable, etc.) lumber is produced? How much electricity does a cord of wood produce? How much wood/resident*year is required? What is the maximum $/cord (sell as firewood, sell as kiln dried lumber, make into furniture)?
Three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchenette and a small sitting area. Individuals get their own room, couples share a room. The three bedroom setup supports families (parents, boys, girls). We'll try to keep the average occupancy around 1.75 people/room, so we need about 86 rooms, for about 29 buildings.


==== Library ====
=== Food ===
Not quite in the traditional sense, I expect there would be very few actual books. But it would be a place for people to go and do research.  
We can grow raw foods and purchase raw foods. Raw foods can be sold or processed. Raw and processed foods can be consumed by residents or sold. The question becomes what is the cheapest way to produce enough healthy, tasty food for residents and what has the best ROI when sold.


==== Mess Hall ====
=== Other ROI ===
Meals are prepared, served and eaten here.
Considering my background, it may make sense to incorporate software development, not because it's a per-existing requirement (it's clearly not) but because it has a very high ROI, it will probably beat lumber and food. So we employ enough people to run a small software shop, and that produces enough revenue to cover the services they consume. We can extend this, any business that we can run with a high ROI is advantageous.


==== Bath House ====
=== Everything ===
Because each building does not have it's own full bath, this is where people bath. It would be nice to include some luxury items like a sauna and hot-tub. Perhaps some gym equipment as well.
It ends up being a calculus problem, like rocket fuel. Assume we need to provide services to one resident. We need one person managing lumber, woodworking and construction. One person managing kitchen and garden. One person doing housework. And one person managing utilities.  


==== Workshop ====
So we need four people. If we have four people, how much money leaves the system per year. Some goes to taxes and some goes to things that must be purchased. How much income can be generated by the person managing the kitchen and the person managing construction. Also, there is (initially) some loss to paying off the investment. Say construction costs $1,000,000, we may be paying 5%/year or $50,000.
Tools and building materials.


==== Utilities ====
With enough data, we should be able to reasonable predict how much profit is produced per resident*employee. But it's a threshold problem. Maybe one kitchen staff can service up to 15 residents, but at the 16th resident, you need 2 kitchen staff. But 2 maybe able to handle more than 30, maybe they can handle 45. Eventually it evens out.
Combined, water, power, heat, sewage and compost. The primary heat source would be solar. Sewage would provide methane (through a digester). After it has ceased releasing methane, sewage would then move on for composting, which can also be used to help heat water. The warm water can by cycled through radiators in homes to help regulate temperature. The methane can be used for cooking, and serve as the final step in heating up water to a temperature sufficient to run either a Stirling engine or a steam turbine.


=== Stages ===
For example, let's say ROI on excess labor in lumber, construction and kitchen is $25/hr or $50000/emp. Utilities are 1emp/20residents, lumber is 1emp/5construction, construction is 1emp/30residents, farm is 1emp/1kitchen, kitchen is 1emp/20residents, housekeeping is 1emp/30residents, management is 1emp/25emp. Overhead is $5000/emp, plus the $50,000 on the investment.
Building should probably be done in two stages, The first stage will be largely temporary. Designed to handle 1-25 people. After that, we can go back through, tear down one building at a time and build a long-term structure designed to handle 150 people.


=== Algorithms ===
I have to take into account income loss. Util, house keeping and management cannot convert excess labor to revenue.  
I've played around with using genetic algorithms for layouts. This would be a good opportunity. It could plan walkways and gardens, take into account factors like the distance from each home to important buildings (mess/bath). It could even take into account building phases so that the initial period (1-15 people) works well, but so does the growth from 15 to 50 and so on.


== Social Structure ==
See [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CxZsYGPX-5qsHz4nOjGX0jrryaktY0bD7h2zwhyuXto/edit?usp=sharing sheet]. It works out pretty well right around 40 residents.
Decision making will be a largely democratic process. People can choose their involvement. Having a group of this size self-organize should happen pretty naturally.
 
Almost all subsistence needs can be met by the community (food, water, shelter). The community should also provide it's members with health insurance (see Money). Clothing, on the other hand, will be left to the individual.
 
=== Policy Grid ===
A 3x3 grid allowing for the categorization of policies. Along one dimension is the balance of supply and demand - excess supply, balanced, excess demand. Along the other dimension is necessity - necessary, improvement, recreation. Each cell on the grid can be addressed separately.
 
For instance, I would expect cooking to land on necessary, excess demand. It is necessary because we need to eat, but people enjoy cooking so I expect we would regularly have more volunteers than are necessary. However, we will still want to give some sort of "credit" to it because we want the most skilled.
 
I would expect cleaning to be necessary with excess supply because again, it's necessary but this time it's not something people will want to do. Something like decorative carving would be improvement, balanced because we want to increase the aesthetics of the colony, and I expect that enough people will want to do it that we can keep a steady supply churned out.
 
=== Reddit ===
This being the modern age and all, it would be very effective to use a Reddit like system for the democratic process. Member could participate in discussions and up/down vote what they agree/disagree with or simply based on how relevant the discussion is.
 
Based on group-think, the following may be a balanced approach. Open a topic for discussion and set a time-line for the following steps. Some time for solitary consideration. During this time individual are encouraged to educate themselves and consider the topic, but discussion on the topic is discouraged. By the end of solitary consideration, those who wish to can submit proposals and statements. After this, all submitted proposals and statements will be released for everyone to review and discussion (both online and offline) is open. Individuals can continue to submit proposals and statements, but now group collaboration will also be accepted. In the final stage, proposals are nominated for consideration, a final round of debate happens and the topic is closed with a vote. Part of the final vote also selects an individual or committee (or no one, depending on the nature of things) to resolve the final proposals. This group is responsible for merging all the language and resolving contradictions. This group could be independently elected, it could be either the author or nominator for each bill, or each bill that passes could have a separately elected representative.
 
I formed this idea a while ago, but this may be a good place to employ it. A council could be formed with 'vote entrusting'. Individuals entrust their vote to a representative. Only reps can speak and vote in council meetings. Who ever holds the most votes is the chair. Votes by reps are public, but after reps have voted, individuals have an opportunity to change their vote, this remains private. This scheme cuts the number of members that can sit on the council automatically in half. Reps can't betray their constituents, because the constituents can just flip the votes back.
 
== Money ==
This will be a bit touchy. For the most part, the organization and it's members money should stay separate. People absolutely do not pay to be a member and they are not guaranteed an income. They earn their stay with work. But the community will need some funds. These should be accomplished with community projects. The most basic is that any surplus food can be sold. It may be possible to build and sell things. But the area where I think the most potential lies is in services. A community of 150 well educated people can probably provide a lot of digital services and make a decent income. But this could create some issues in how people are valued in the community.
 
Another note that should be put here - I think that ostentatious displays of wealth would be damaging to the community. People should be encouraged to avoid this.
 
== Swarming ==
Or budding or whatever other terms there are for super-organism reproduction. At around 100 we will being preparing to split. I actually expect there to be some pretty clear lines of division within the colony at that time, so splitting along those lines will probably make sense. Now there will be two colonies with slightly divergent philosophies. There will still be strong ties and cooperation between the colonies, but they will become mostly separate entities. As the sum of these colonies approaches 180, we will again start planning another division. This time only about 1/3 of each colony will go. Over time, it will transition from mass-emigration to a constant trickle. The colonies will hold their numbers closer to 150. At that point I would like to see a structure arise where colonies can become specialized and hold more nuanced philosophies. Like minded people from all the colonies can communicate and when a niche is identified, they can collect and form a new colony. Also, at this point, people should be able to move between colonies. Not regularly, but as the nature of the colonies shifts.
 
== Chores ==
One of the challenges would be dividing up chores. This could be done with envy-free game theory. We'll start with an arbitrary point system. Something like every needs to earn 100 points every two weeks. Now create a list of everything that needs to get done. The algorithm will give people two choices do A for X points or B for Y points (the question is theoretical, members will answer a few dozen questions like this while the algorithm is calibrating). Each answer nudges things a little more into balance. By the end, it should be fairly balanced so that everyone will earn their points and everything will get done.
 
Some chores will not be available to everyone - these will be "skills" or "skilled-chores". They just require some training before they're available.
 
Beyond that some highly specialized roles will be "jobs". Some jobs will be taking on responsibility for some large section of operation. For instance someone will be responsible for running the kitchen. Other jobs will help earn revenue. When people take on a job it give them some allotment of points per week.  
 
[[Category:Earthship]]

Latest revision as of 17:50, 9 July 2015

This used to be a very different idea, but through a few iterations, it moved into the realm of feasible.

Core Concept

Dorms for adults. Every unit is comprised of some number of room and bathrooms. Rooms are all 12x12. The smallest (and most common) unit is 2 rooms, one bath. The idea that and individual or couple has a bedroom and a sitting room. Rent include food and access to facilities (laundry, small kitchen, etc.). For a little more, it includes services, basic housekeeping and a gardener (the units use grey water reclamation, so they all have a small indoor garden.

To manage and expand this will require a whole business, several actually. House keeping, kitchen, construction and utilities. From there, it makes sense to extend kitchen to farming/gardening to bring down the price of fresh fruit and vegetables. And construction can extend to wood working and lumber.

Layout

The main section will only be an acre or two. Some number of units plus all the support buildings. More area will be taken up by gardens and farms. Beyond that, a huge area will be taken up by forests. The forests are mainly to provide lumber, but they can incorporate permaculture to provide food as well.

Employment

The idea is that most people involved both live and work here. It's not a requirement (either direction) but it's the goal. In order for that to be sustainable, there must be exports. Based on the requirements above, the two most logical exports are food and wood products. Both can range from raw to processed goods.

The Maths

The question is how many people do we need in order to make something sustainable.

Lumber

A sustainable forest can produce about 1/2 cord/year. The heart wood can be used for lumber products, the rest can be used in a variety of other ways - composted, wood chips or burned to heat water or produce electricity.

There are several relevant formulas here that need variables filled in. What is the maximum useable lumber production per acre*year? At that level, how much secondary (burnable, etc.) lumber is produced? How much electricity does a cord of wood produce? How much wood/resident*year is required? What is the maximum $/cord (sell as firewood, sell as kiln dried lumber, make into furniture)?

Food

We can grow raw foods and purchase raw foods. Raw foods can be sold or processed. Raw and processed foods can be consumed by residents or sold. The question becomes what is the cheapest way to produce enough healthy, tasty food for residents and what has the best ROI when sold.

Other ROI

Considering my background, it may make sense to incorporate software development, not because it's a per-existing requirement (it's clearly not) but because it has a very high ROI, it will probably beat lumber and food. So we employ enough people to run a small software shop, and that produces enough revenue to cover the services they consume. We can extend this, any business that we can run with a high ROI is advantageous.

Everything

It ends up being a calculus problem, like rocket fuel. Assume we need to provide services to one resident. We need one person managing lumber, woodworking and construction. One person managing kitchen and garden. One person doing housework. And one person managing utilities.

So we need four people. If we have four people, how much money leaves the system per year. Some goes to taxes and some goes to things that must be purchased. How much income can be generated by the person managing the kitchen and the person managing construction. Also, there is (initially) some loss to paying off the investment. Say construction costs $1,000,000, we may be paying 5%/year or $50,000.

With enough data, we should be able to reasonable predict how much profit is produced per resident*employee. But it's a threshold problem. Maybe one kitchen staff can service up to 15 residents, but at the 16th resident, you need 2 kitchen staff. But 2 maybe able to handle more than 30, maybe they can handle 45. Eventually it evens out.

For example, let's say ROI on excess labor in lumber, construction and kitchen is $25/hr or $50000/emp. Utilities are 1emp/20residents, lumber is 1emp/5construction, construction is 1emp/30residents, farm is 1emp/1kitchen, kitchen is 1emp/20residents, housekeeping is 1emp/30residents, management is 1emp/25emp. Overhead is $5000/emp, plus the $50,000 on the investment.

I have to take into account income loss. Util, house keeping and management cannot convert excess labor to revenue.

See sheet. It works out pretty well right around 40 residents.

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