I’ve been slowly converting all of my outdoor lighting to solar and adding more rain barrels for my garden. This got me thinking–what are the rest of you working on? I’d love to see and hear about your projects if you feel like sharing them.
Thanks in advance, I hope you’re all having a wonderful day!
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I just helped my neighbor replace his front lawn with low-growing roman chamomile and lavender. I’m hoping to rig up a little solar powered water feature using secondhand parts soon.
I have getting ready to replace the holes in the solitary bee house I set up at my parents’ place:
I’ve been cutting 6" sticks from storm damaged tree limbs, and drilling the various-size holes (I’ve got a set of 8" metric drill bits that get the full-length they need (some folk just use cardboard tubes or reeds, but this works fine for me. It’s important to replace the sticks every year after they emerge so we don’t propagate diseases or parasites in the solitary bees.
Once I find a couple 6"x1" oak boards (maybe when someone throws out a bed?) I’ll be able to cut the arching back pieces for a wood and cast iron park bench I’m trying to fix up. I need to take a wire wheel to the rusty metal parts, then paint it and fabricate the wooden parts of the back (I already have the slats for the seat but they do need to be sanded, stained, urethaned, and attached). Then I can put it out near our local bike path.
Need to put a new tire and tube on my front bike wheel.
One of my hobbies is fixing up ewaste laptops and giving them to an organization in my city that rehomes refugees. I actually do ewaste in general, mostly through our local Buy Nothing groups, (everything from HDMI adapters to space heaters) but the modern-ish laptops go to the charity. I was able to get three laptops ready to go recently, and I’ll be looking for more to work on for folks in my community next.
The Lenovo and MacBook Air came from a friend at the recycling center - he’s allowed to set computers aside for donation if he catches the people dropping them off and gets permission, otherwise they get sent away for secure destruction. He also gets me laptop chargers sometimes too, which saves a ton of money. The one in the middle I found in corporate ewaste (I got permission to dig through on occasion). Everything’s been tested and wiped and updated as far as it’ll go. This set was easy, they were all intact, so I didn’t have to get any replacement parts.
I’m also working on a set of photobashes, styled like postcards from a solarpunk future, that I’m hoping will help push the visual aspect of solarpunk art more towards the rest of the movement. I want people to see solarpunk art and think, “why aren’t we doing that?” or “could that work?” I think it should depict a more lived-in, human future and demonstrate possibilities, technologies, and alternative ways of doing things. I’m also trying to cover seasons, locations, and topics like industry that I haven’t seen in other solarpunk art to sway people’s first impressions from thinking it’s an empty aesthetic. I try to advocate for values like reuse I think fit the movement but are underrepresented in the visual artwork.
All great projects–I actually run a nonprofit that refurbishes old computers and devices and gives them away to folks who need them. I’m glad to see someone else thinking along the same lines!
Hey are you planning on selling those laptops? I was hacked and reduced to working from my phone.
Sorry to hear that. I give them away whenever I finish one (these ones are already handed off to a refugee resettlement agency though I also sometimes offer them up on my local Buy Nothing group). If your old laptop still has its original OS working you might be able to do a factory reset, or worst case, as long as the hardware works, you could try to install Linux Mint on it, which is what I’d do. Best of luck!
I sold them for parts.
What is that thing in the tree? A bee house? Will it call a swarm of bees? I have only a couple small trees, but I don’t really want a swarm…
Yes, it’s a home for solitary bees. There are a bunch of species of solitary bees, who don’t live in hives or swarm with others. They’re still an important part of our ecosystem and play a big role in pollination but they don’t get quite as much attention as the honeybees.
They collect pollen to survive and to feed their young. Typically they find a hole of the right size, like the ones in these sticks, and make a bunch of compartments inside (out of mud or chewed plant fibers) where they lay their eggs. They give each egg some pollen they’ve gathered and seal them in for the winter. In the spring the eggs hatch and new bees emerge, eat the pollen, dig their way out, and start the cycle again.
It’s good to identify the kinds of bees you want, since they need different size holes, and to put the house somewhere the morning sun will hit it, near some flowers or flowering shrubs.
It’s a nice way to help provide habitats. Solitary bees are typically pretty skittish and won’t/can’t form angry swarms because of the whole solitary thing. Carpenter bees will sometimes fly close to humans, but mostly because they’re just big curious bumbling buddies and they’re nearsighted. Once they figure out what you are they fly away. I’ve never had any trouble with the residents of our bee house.
Are the postcards for a solarpunk future for sale? I couldn’t find them…
I just make them available for free - the images with their text writeups are here: https://jacobcoffinwrites.wordpress.com/postcards-from-a-solarpunk-future/
And the full size versions are available here: https://mega.nz/folder/PA1XGQhQ#eXMPhzAwkv01_PQDINJvfw
If you wanted to own a physical copy feel free to get them printed
We just had a very similar topic here: https://slrpnk.net/post/9408197
But if you are especially interested in gardening: I am currently thinking about how to DIY a simple automated irrigation system for the tomatoes and pepper plants in my little greenhouse so that I can do a camping trip later this summer without them dying.
My Grandparents found a solution to the watering problem, its called Children an Grandchildren…
We are trying to get it automated for them, but without success.
One wonders what automating the child production process would look like . . .
I think robogromo’s /c/pigrow might be able to help with this, though it has so many features it might overshoot what you need.
One of my neighbors moved out and I’ve mostly been murdering the tiger lilies he planted in the common areas. (He said he liked them and the deer would keep them in check. The deer only ate them in the spring, and he ‘liked’ them because then his pitbulls could chase the deer. Fucker . Then one of the other neighbors’ dogs chewed on the lilies and got sick, so …)
Anyway, I’ve replacing them with a mix of like 20 local pollinator plants, chosen for a mix of both pollinators and seasons. Trying to figure out how I can get some rain barrels in to feed the new gardens without pissing off the HOA, and carrying on the eternal battle to let the HOA let us install solar (beyond the two panels we hid in the backyard, but we can’t get any more in there).
Common area veggie garden has finally settled in, and the apple trees should be bearing fruit in another year. [The berry bushes we snuck in the woods are doing nicely, and the local animals love them!]
God bless you for keeping the local pollinators going and for supporting your local ecosystem in the face of an HOA. I’d love to hear more about this if you’d like to get in touch directly.
Not sure if it is viable for you, but there are solar shingles. Might be able to slip that past the hoa if needed.
I have been talking to a friend who lives in a mobile home near Albuquerque. He is thinking about installing a roof above the home to keep it a little cooler in the summer. To that end I am recommending he use decommissioned panels as the roof and connecting them through a transfer switch to a mini split ac. This has the advantage of using cheap panels from Santan solar (which cannot be grid tied) for free cooling during the hotest hours of the day, while retaining the ability to run the ac at night.
That is a great idea! My house’s roof bakes in the sun all day and I’ve been looking for options.
Still setting up the new house - so far got the entirely solar powered lighting for my workbench in my office going, and parts of the solar watering system as well as the solar powered garage vent
Gonna repurpose the maze mini tanks from the old place to increase our total storage - setting up an interlinked system with floats so that the 2kl gutter fed tank will automatically keep the smaller ones topped up (which then feed the irrigatia and wicking beds).
Also planning out the solar powered lighting for the basement…busy busy busy…
I’d love to hear more about the watering system!
A lot of it is built around the waterwand / irrigatia system - fantastic units, cannot recommend enough.
Once again my life is hampered by the fact that I do not live in Australia . . .
Irrigatia are the Eu/ US brand, try searching on that.
It’s literally the same two brothers working together, one just lives in Australia and had to rebrand due to existing trademark kerfuffles
Oh wow. Thank you for the heads up. I will look into this right now.
Rainmaker do the same thing, but they’re a knockoff
Good to know, thanks for the heads up!
Well, there’s a DIY electric car which needs both axles to be re-designed. They didn’t pass driving tests in the field. Design is complete but welding cannot start before weather turns nicer.
Also, my house needs a battery shed on wheels - wheels to keep away construction bureaucrats, shed because it’s uncomfortable to sleep under the same roof with a very considerable amount of lithium cells. I’d like to keep some distance from them so that if something goes wrong, it’s would be just the cells. :) The bottom platform with wheels is complete, walls and roof and everything such - nope, not a trace, not even a good drawing. :)
If I lived closer I’d volunteer to help just to see this beautiful insanity come together. I like the “wheels” work around!
There’s a pretty high chance that when it does come together, it will be presented somehow on c/offgrid on this very server. :)
Can’t wait to see it! :)
I like them odds, keep us posted!
Hey hey 💫👋 I’m working on creating a one-stop spot for someone who wants to surf carbon neutrally or as near as possible. This means a green payment gateway, a source of entertainment, a place to find out how to make a living eco, and a place to socialize and date. I’m so proud of the business plan because it actually makes money and I have some nice meetings coming up. Just wish I had people to work with :)
I work in media and marketing and I’d love to discuss the possibilities. Cool if I message you?
Yes please
Not having outdoor lighting, seriously. I’ve been workibg on using less for years, trying to drill down between needs and wants.
We can’t buy our way out of this using more resources, the only thing truly renewable is organic.
Less is more.
The world is genuinely unprepared for a situation that can’t be resolved by throwing money at it. You’re doing the right/smart thing in doing the part you can do. Thank you for that food for thought.
