SEH Cost Savings

Hint: This page describes how we can reduce the cost of materials and build cost of a 1375 sf Seed Eco-Home from $60k to $10k in materials by using open source machines and materials production machines

About Cost Reduction

The way to reduce housing cost is by:

1. Optimized Design - open source blueprints, design optimization with integrated design, and open production engineering. All are required for an efficient build that exceeds industry standards.
2. Open-source compliance documentation - producing documentation and engineering reference drawings to reduce permit, plan check, and engineering costs from thousands to near zero marginal cost
3. Efficient Build - 24 person, 5 day modular swarm build that exponentiates learning
4. Open Source Machines - for construction and materials production. Seed Eco-Home Savings with Open Source Construction Machines - $4340
5. Open Source Fuels - plastic pyrolysis for gas and diesel obtained from waste stream plastic. Followed by the full blown Solar Hydrogen Economy
6. Materials Cost Reduction - see Seed Eco-Home Materials Cost Reduction - $45300

If the current cost is $60k for materials for a 1375 sf 3 bed 2 bath home with 6kW photovoltaics, we can slash this cost to $10k with open source machines and materials. Total Savings in an Open Sector Enterprise are $49640.

It would be impossible for any enterprise to execute on the above without open source hardware. This also includes in addition to the above:

1. Automated grading - cost reduction of $2k in labor. Once built, lifetime design operating costs must be considered:
2. Thermal Battery - 70% electrical consumption reduction out of the box because water heating, cooling, and hot water are 70% of all electric use. Integration with Direct Geothermal makes sense. $700/year savings in electricity means significant cost reduction.
3. Open Source Inverter - $2k savings for every 5 years lifetime of an inverter.
4. Open Source Heat Pump - $2k every 5 years for 5 year lifetime of a heat pump

Higher tech endeavors include:

1. Photovoltaics Manufacturing - currently cost is 20 cents per watt, as low as 7 cents from china. If we assume $100 for a 500W panel, it is hard to beat but we gain in recyclability and lifetime if we design the PV panels to be recycled or building-integrated. With open source automated production, we can transition such manufacturing from gigafactories to distributed megafactories. This is feasible because the starting material is sand, and Upgraded Metallurgical Silicon is an interesting route.

Priorities Narrative

The general narrative is to displace as much by 3D printing as possible, up to nonstructural infill, deck lumber, pervious pavement block, geogrid, and geotextile. Start on complex components like windows and doors with composites. For windows, off-the-shelf glass can be used with gas infill using TPU seals. Insulation experiments should commence with multiwall polycarbonate glazing, or honeycomb cells, or fine spaghetti - in addition to solar hempcrete and 3D printed hemp-SIPs.

Lumber is low hanging fruit using an open source lumber mill, adding CNC and using trusses like in the Large Workshop Structure

Concrete experiments with a lime kiln, in 6kW modules stackable to 100 kW. This requires an open source rock crusher, 40 hp for 10 ton per hour production, or even 5 ton/hr with 18 hp This is easy.

Roofless Roof can be implemented readily to eliminate or minimize RPE usage.

For machines, the Open Source Skid Steer does many construction tasks, and retrofit with automation for precision guidance and automated mission planning.

Plastic Pyrolysis can save about $500 in fuel per house.

For cost reduction based on the above, including strategic elements of public appeal and versatile applications, the priority list is:

1. Open source 3D printing via recycling in plastics, and composites - today. For over $22k savings. Also relevant to hydroponic-aeroponic 3d printed char-embedded growing pots -
   1. What is the shredder we should build?
   2. What is the filament maker we should build?
   3. Should we invest in pellet-based printing? Not favorable for large clusters - as extruders are $500 instead of $50 such that a 12-printer cluster gets expensive. Advantage is one less extrusion - doubling plastic recyclability. But if we assume permanent prints embodied in structures - recyclability is not as big an issue.
2. Open Source Skid Steer - built with CNC Torch Table.
3. Open source CNC lumber mill - $10k in lumber saved
4. Open Source Incinerating Toilet - game changer for off-grid sanitation, reducing cost drastically. Using PV as energy source. Also to reduce cost where on-grid sanitation can be replaced.

1. Lime Kiln and supporting infrastructure - $3k in concrete + rock.
2. 3D Printed Hempcrete Block - simple box lattices filled with hemp to provide insulation with compression zone on top so block can stack without air gaps. Still needs continuous skin.
3. 3D Printed Hemp-SIPs - this is far out but doable with 3d printed lattice, hemp infill, and continuous skin coat of cementitious material [1]
4. Hempcrete Insulation - with Solar Concrete, can save about $3k in insulation costs if we displace all fiberglass.
5. CEB Press - up to $5k in materials saved for house walls. Doable readily for unstabilized block if house has overhangs for moisture proofing, or a skin over the CEBs such as metal barn siding. Otherwise requires soil conditioning machines for mixing cement into the soil. Both are viable. But CEB is damn hard to do, so it's not as high in the priority list as 3D printing, which is exotic, and lumber - which is easier to build with.
6. Open Source Inverter - needed because it is the weak part of solar power system - due to potential breakage.
7. Open Source Heat Pump - off-the-shelf components integrated with open source controller and 3D printed body.
8. 3D printed Windows - in the simplest instance, stackable interlocking panels, with 3D printed frame and standard glass. If we 3D print an integrated TPU gasket, we could be talking about gas-tight design for argon fill using an open source Cryogenic Distillation of Liquid Air.
9. Open Source Reverse Osmosis - water purification and desalination. Relevant to Open Source Blueberries program.

Links

• 24 Person Operation Definition of Done