Seed Eco-Home Features 2022

Hint: These are the eco features for the 2022 Seed Eco-Home. For the 2016 model, see Seed Eco-Home Features 2016

1. House comes with a full-off grid 6kW as  a standard option - sufficient to run heating, cooling, water heating, cooking, and all appliances - 100% on solar - with the caveat that the system has practically no energy storage and avoids the use of a large battery bank. We increased this from 3kW of the first Seed Eco-Home. This allows an energy-conscious family to run almost all of their needs from solar electricity on sunny and cloudy days - though the system has to be switched back to grid whenever there is heavy cloud cover and required power is high. This is for those individuals who are eco-conscious and can adapt to a solar lifestyle. This leaves a choice to run fully on the grid - or fully on solar. This does require working during the day - so if one has a nocturnal lifestyle - then the solar option does not work.
2. House comes with an 800 square foot Aquaponic Greenhouse as a standard option. This allows a family to grow most of their nutrition needs right in a greenhouse - with fish, vegetables, and fruits of their choice. This requires one to invest time into the greenhouse - so we will be developing turnkey maintanance contracts for anyone whose busy lifestyle does not allow for managing the greenhouse at its productive capacity. The limit of possibility, however, is growing all of one's caloric needs for 1-2 people - right in the 800 square foot aquaponic greenhouse space. See calculations and assumptions at [1]
3. It is a compact starter home with an efficient design - at 1000 square feet of space, compared to the larger 2500 sq ft average size. This means that much less environmental impact and cost all around - to build, power, heat, and cool. Maintenance is easier because of its transparent, open source design.#Incremental housing - We predesigned the Rosebud Model for easy expansion. By preframing hidden door modules, using a utility channel to which new electrical connections can be added, and by pre-plumbing expansion lines for water - we allow another 1000 square feet to be added readily to the back of the house. This allows a family to buy a house that one can afford, and expand as their needs and finances grow - so that there is no need for a huge mortgage. See the concept of Incremental Housing.
4. Shallow Insulated Footer - makes the house an earth contact home, allowing for heat tranfer from soil under the house that stays 60F year round. Also costs 15-20% less. see [2].
5. Heat pump - 3x more efficient than typical heaters [3]. furnace. Also used for central cooling in the summer. Saves about $500 in heating per year for the Seed Eco-Home, and cuts carbon emissions 2x [4]
6. Induction cooktop - according to one source, about 80% efficient, which is about double the efficiency of gas cooking [5]. Another source says 3x as efficient as gas and 10-15% more efficient than electric cooktops. [6]. Saves about $100/year in cooking costs [7].
7. Washer - We use an LG Condensing Combination Washer Dryer. It is a 2-in-one machine which does not require you to move clothes from the washer into the dryer - saving you time and effort. It doesn't require a vent (significant savings in house build costs) because it condenses water from the dryer. And it saves 2000 gallons of water per year because of its efficient, front-loading design, and saves about $77 total in electricity and water bills per year compared to a typical washer.
8. Superfridge - For our refrigerator, we use a highly insulated chest freezer converted to a refrigerator simply by putting it on a timer, which is about 10x more efficient than a standard refrigerator. This is a standard option depending on one's needs of energy efficiency or convenience. But, if you would like to have an annual refrigerator bill of $1.5 with the Seed Eco-Home off-grid PV option - as opposed to the average of $88 for a standard home - this is for you. See more info at Superfridge.
9. Toilet - We start with the lowest water use flush model - at 0.8 gallons per flush compared to the standard 1.8 - saving about 2000 gallons per person per year for a typical household. The house also comes with a standard option bidet connected to a hot water line - so if one is interested in a more hygienic approach - one can also save a staggering $11,000 per person over a lifetime in asswipe! [8]
10. Minitank Water Heater - we use a minitank water heater that requires only 1500W and runs from the solar panels. We also offer the high quality
11. Social Ecology - we build the houses as swarm builds in 5 days, which can be built by regular crews, or as part of an immersion learning/productive experience which we call Extreme Manufacturing. This means that different communities can hold 'barnraising' style events where a complete house is built in rapid time - allowing for economic development in standard market conditions or in DIY builder scenarios.
12. Human-Centered Design - We design houses that focus on simplicity and ease of build - so that anyone who can use cordless drill, cutoff saw, and a hammer can build one. This means that the DIY person can build a home to their taste, because the house is like a Lego set for buildings, with modules that do not require heavy machines to lift. See the introduction to the Open Building Institute in our video from 2016 - the concept is still 100% relevant - [9]
13. Product Ecology - the house evolves over time, and the current snapshot if far from what we plan in its development roadmap. Our next steps, in priority order, are the CEB version of the house, which also uses 3D printed building materials made from recycled plastic and wood. Following this, we plan to expand our open source PV system to hydrogen production and storage, so that the Seed Eco-Home can run 100% off grid and at night on solar hydrogen, as well as fuel cars running on solar hydrogen. Our next steps also include getting the Open Source Biodigester code-approved, so that when integrated with the Aquaponic Greenhouse and an open source Atmospheric Water Generator, we attain a closed loop water system - all the way to potable water. As such, the eventual goal is a 1000 square foot house that we can produce at a $20k cost to the end customer (subsidized version) and a $100k cost for the non-subsidized version. Currently our baseline cost structure includes $60k in materials and $50k in labor - and these can be reduced by production of Solar Concrete, products from the Open Source Materials Production Facility, and robotic automation. Thus, our end point is an autonomous house that also produces its own food, energy, and water, is built with local and recycled materials, and is also a personal gas station - all from renewable solar energy. To get there - requires a long-term vision, an integrated entrepreneurial skill set - and simply the openness to learn new things and break through to a mindset of collaborative design for a transparent and inclusive economy of abundance.