In the North East of Brazil, millions of people battle to grow food around their houses due to toxic grey water from washing and sewage that runs outside. But now a newly designed biowater filtering system has the potential to change all of their lives. The dirty water passes through a filtering system. The filtered water is then clean enough to use to irrigate the land. This is the story of Ulisses dos Santos who has tested out the system for one year. Now he is not only eating better, but also making a profit.” Read more from > 1 Million Greywater Systems for Brazil

“This open source Information Package is in response to the great, unmet demand for safe and affordable housing in a region prone to earthquake, tsunami and typhoons. After the recent Typhoon Haiyan EBS has decided to upload this disaster resistant low cost housing solution for SE Asia as open source information. Read more from > Low Cost Disaster Resistant Housing Package for SE Asia

Within the same alternative community as Ted’s ruins (see the previous post) is Sean’s Adobe House, also featured in my Sampler of Alternative Homes video. Sean Sands built this house about 20 years ago for less than $1,000. He used the native soil, which is an almost perfect adobe mix of about 25% clay and 75% sand. All he would do is moist the soil where he wanted to harvest adobe the night before he planned to dig it. Then he placed the damp soil in a hydraulic ram press to make compressed earth blocks. He would let these cure in the sun for a few days before building with them. Part of the walls of the house were made with old tires packed with soil.

Read more from > Sean’s Adobe House

I have been traveling in a little RV, visiting various places in New Mexico where I haven’t been for about a decade. Today I went back to a little community near Columbus and the Mexican border where I once had spent quite a bit of time when I was making a documentary video called A Sampler of Alternative Homes. One of the Homes I profiled in that film was Ted Specker’s abode, one of the more unusual places of all.

Ted died a few years ago and his domain has been abandoned since then. I was curious how his diggings have survived. Since I had been there Ted had done quite a bit more building, so there were new forms to behold. Everything was showing some of the ravages of time, but all of it was still interesting, as you can see by this series of photos. Read more from > Ted’s Ruins

“A guided tour to Auroville and Pondicherry. Video shows accommodations available and pricing, as well as a glimpse of the Auroville experience.”

(Video repeats near the end, otherwise very well done.) Read more from > Auroville, India – Accommodations

“Seaweed pillows [knit mesh tubes filled with dried seaweed] were used as cladding for this holiday house on the Danish island of Læsø by architecture studio Vandkunsten and non-profit organisation Realdania Byg. Read more from > Modern Seaweed Houses