Rob Roy's Earthwood Home

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The important thing is that we concentrated the double-pane windows on the southern exposure for solar gain. In fact, the solar room downstairs, which faces exactly south, helps to heat the home on a sunny sub zero day.

The Masonry Stove

The 23-ton, round, stone masonry stove at the heart of Earthwood burns wood about 35% more efficiently than most ordinary woodstoves, another percentage to factor into the equation. The wood is burned hot and fast, so combustion of wood gasses is near perfect. No creosote and very little pollution. The stove is safe and en vironmentally friendly, but the greatest advantage is the tempering influence of 23 tons of thermal mass that can give up its heat only to the home's interior, not directly to the outside. It grieves me to see so many masonry chimneys fastened, to the outside of the gable end of a house. It may look pretty for the neighbors, but it's an energy disaster. Put that beautiful stone masonry inside the home with you, where it can warm your body and your heart.

Build it Round

The typical home's rectangle design is 43% less space efficient than a
circular one.

Burning "Waste" Wood

All these design details compound efficiencies tremendously. But $75? "Give me a break!" I can hear thousands of readers saying. Stay with me. Over 14 years, careful measurement of our fuel (wood) consump tion reveals that Earthwood requires 3 1/4 full cords of wood per heating season. And the house stays at a steady comfortable temperature. In the summer of 1994, I bought 3 1/3 full cords of hard maple slabs cut into 4' lengths, the waste product of a local sawmill that makes rail ties and other squared hardwood blocks. The cost was $12 per cord ($40 total), plus $30 for delivery. I cut the slabs to 16" lengths for about $5 worth of chainsaw gas and oil, thus my fuel cost is $75. And the thin slab wood is the perfect size of stick to burn hot and fast in the masonry stove. As I write these words, I am warmed by wood that was burned in the stove yesterday. Despite unspringlike temperatures and a strong wind outside, we have not fired a stove today. The home's residual heat combined with the solar gain keep us nice and toasty.

Many Earthwood homes have been built all over North America using the techniques that we have developed over the past 20 years. Let's look at some of the more unconventional techniques in detail.

The Floating Slab
Building on coarse sand or gravel will allow the foundation to "float" through frost heaves.

Floating Slab

Earthwood is built on a "floating slab," which, incidentally, was Frank Lloyd Wright's favorite foundation system. Although most of the home's perimeter is well below grade and does not require frost protection, the front portion of the home, including the solar room, might be subject to frost heaving, that nasty situation where water in the earth freezes, expands, and "heaves" the building upwards, causing structural damage. The common "solution" is to try to outguess the frost depth. The Plattsburgh, N.Y., building department, for example, requires all foundations to be at least 4' deep. The floating slab, however, takes another approach. The slab "floats" upon a "pad" of good percolating material, such as coarse sand, gravel, or crushed stone, which does not hold water. No water to freeze equals no frost heaving.

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