Low Tech Lab (a French organization devoted to useful, accessible, and durable technologies) interviews Alex Ziegler of Living Energy Farm.
Sustainability
Communes in the Age of Trump
by Raven
I imagine that most Commune Life readers are not happy with the election of our former president. (If you are, I wonder what you expect.)
Of course, this isn’t the first time that Trump has been elected. In January of 2017, the Atlantic magazine published an article entitled “Seeking an Escape from Trump’s America”. It featured a bunch of folks who talked about joining or being in an intentional community as a way of being protected from the chaos of the new administration. One of the communities profiled was Living Energy Farm.
When Trump was elected in 2016 I was living in the Ganas community in New York City. It’s not an income-sharing community per se (although the core group shares not only income, but assets) and it is not an egalitarian community (and they will tell you that) but it could be a very caring community and the morning after the election (when few folks had expected Trump and the Republican party to be swept into office) we had a regularly scheduled planning meeting. We threw out the agenda and we were just there for each other. I wondered how people outside of community were able to deal with this. I was so glad to be a part of a community where we could support each other when something like this happened.
This time around I’m living in a very small income sharing community and, honestly, we have barely talked about the election. Of course it wasn’t the surprise that his first election was. But the community that I’m in focuses on interdependence and mutual aid, and I think that those are some of the most important things that we will need during the trying times ahead.
Community, as I pointed out above, means you don’t have to be alone with the trying times ahead. Communities like Living Energy Farm (and ecovillages like Dancing Rabbit and Earthaven, not income-sharing but committed to ecological living) are developing the tools that we will need to live in the age of climate change, even as the Trump administration will probably slash most of the “Clean Energy” development funds. Small communities like the Possibility Alliance, the Baltimore Free Farm, and Cambia are showing that living simply is not just possible but can be fun. As MAGA Republicans attack immigrants, queer folks, trans folks, and folks of color, communities such as Serenity Solidarity and the Tennessee queer communities offer places of refuge for those affected. And larger communities, such as Twin Oaks, East Wind, and Acorn are often looking for members. The Foundation for Intentional Communities maintains a directory of intentional communities of all kinds.
Beyond the general benefits of community living, income-sharing in particular offers collective shelter from the economic winds ahead. In income-sharing communities, we are not only there for each other emotionally but provide a financial buffer for many folks who would otherwise be struggling.
Perhaps people will begin to realize the need for community as the chaos spreads in 2025. Maybe interest in communities and communes will rise. Hopefully we will be able to rise to the occasion and take folks in and create many more communities of all kinds to meet people’s needs.
I think communities and communes are very important anyway, for a number of reasons, but I think that they are especially important now.
LEF October 2024
Living Energy Farm
October 2024 Newsletter
Land Day 2024
We’re celebrating our 14th Land Day on November 16, 2024 and you’re invited! Festivities start at 2pm. There will be tours, performances, dinner, a corn pit for the kids, a bonfire (weather permitting) and more. See our website for the full schedule and more details. If you haven’t been to LEF before, be aware that it’s a half mile walk from the parking lot to our house. Come prepared for the weather, and bring a flashlight if you plan to stay until dark.
New Video explains Solar Heating, Cooking and Refrigeration Without Battery Storage
More and more, activists and observers are raising concerns about climate mitigation strategies predicated upon utility scale lithium battery storage. Lithium mines, and other extraction projects related to battery production, are already creating devastating human rights and environmental impacts around the world. At LEF, non-electric storage is a critical part of our microgrid. For years we’ve been teaching people that batteries are the most expensive and resource-intensive way to store energy. There are much cheaper, lower impact, and more effective ways to store renewable energy, which include thermal mass, insulation, pressurized water, and biogas.
Sam Butler is an organizer and media-maker from the DC area who has been helping us adapt our message to the broader climate movement. He produced this video, which is being released today. It’s about using non-electric storage for heating, cooking, refrigeration, and other loads. It includes footage from the DC Microgrids at LEF and Magnolia Collective. Check it out! Please share it with yournetworks, and watch it through till the end. Watching the video till the end will help it trend on YouTube, which means the video will reach more people.
Feel free to get in touch if you’d be interested in getting involved with media projects or using these appliances/systems. You can contact us at info@livingenergylights, or contact Sam at homes@sambutler.us and (202) 738-1041 for both LEF and media related work.
The Easy Reaper at the World Food Prize Conference in Iowa
As we go to press, the Easy Reaper is on display at the Borlaug International Dialogue in Des Moines Iowa, an event organized by the World Food Prize. This gathering includes heads of state, CEO’s, academics, and other leaders in agriculture, international development, and resource management. The University of Missouri’s Soybean Innovation Lab is sponsoring our presence at the conference, which aims to “integrate past wisdom, current innovations and the pressing needs of tomorrow, by
leveraging agricultural technology to address contemporary challenges.” It’s a perfect venue for making connections with organizations and government programs that have the resources needed to get the Easy Reaper produced at scale.
Comings and Goings at LEF
We’re excited to have a family- Chrissy, Jenny and Harvey- joining us as new members of Living Energy Farm. They’re from east Texas, where Chrissy has been homesteading off-the-grid on her family’s land. After visiting us last summer, she decided that community was a better fit for her family than homesteading on their own. We’re grateful for the new infusion of energy, enthusiasm, and dinosaur knowledge that they bring to LEF.
We’re a little sad but also excited that John Milner, who has lived with us for three years, is transitioning to the Bay Branch. The Bay Branch is a forming community in Louisa, co-founded by Carrie (Debbie’s sister and ex-LEFer). Their goal is to be off-the-grid with a DC Microgrid, and with John as a co-founder, it’s probably going to happen! We’re looking forward to helping this exciting new project come to fruition in the coming years. Thankfully, John is going to stay involved with Living Energy Lights by continuing to help us with technology development, educational programs, and installations in the Caribbean.
Distributing DC Lighting and Charging Kits in North Carolina
Thanks so much to everyone who donated to our crowdfunder supporting the distribution of DC lighting and charging kits to victims of hurricane Helene. Veronica, who delivered the kits, sent back the following report:
I first visited Lucy (friend of LEF who is a solar installer) at Celo, who took 20 kits to distribute. Holding you in my heart as you and Celo work to recover. After, I went up the mountain to my dear friend Jim’s place— he is the founder of Southern Seed Legacy, and lost his barn/seed storage, and I worked the day with him to save what seeds we could- seeds that he’s worked with Cherokee and other mountain folk to collect over the last 40 years, some of which now only exist with Jim. On my out of Burnsville, some leftover debris from road work gave me a flat tire, and I stopped at Fox Country Store, where I met a rescue volunteer–Russ, who is friends with Mel in Celo; Russ’s family is in Buladean (which is particularly hard hit) and he was headed there for emergency relief and was able to take 5 kits for that community.
The next day I headed to a mutual aid hub in Haywood County, near a site of particular devastation near Clyde. The Pigeon Community Center, which is in normal times a Black-led youth center, is a central operating facility that’s getting aid to the very remote and impassable hollers of the area. Chelsea, who is from this area and a social worker and social justice organizer, had reached out to me asking for any ideas or support for the rural folks out this way. I was able to drop 9 kits directly with her.
Finally, I took supplies and hot meals from the center out to remote areas that were particularly hit. There was a community of mostly Latinx folks in a trailer park by the river that were being supported by the Clyde Christian Fellowship– their homes were entirely destroyed (some broken apart and still hanging in trees). They were living in tents on the land near where their homes had been. They were in tears with the hope of lights, and conveyed that even in normal times power is not consistent here. They took the remaining 8 kits for the 15 families there, and Chelsea will be following up with them to check in on the kits and their ongoing need/use.
Thanks Veronica and everyone else who supported this project. Lucy will be returning to LEF in one week to help with a production run of Roxy Ovens, with the goal to bring cookers and other solar equipment back with her to Western NC. We’re excited to see how our technology can continue to help communities in the mountains who clearly need better options for energy security.
Living Energy Farm is a project to build a demonstration farm, community, and education center in Louisa County that uses no fossil fuels. For more information see our website http://www.livingenergyfarm.org, or contact us at livingenergyfarm@gmail.com or Living Energy Farm, 1022 Bibb Store Rd, Louisa VA, 23093. Donations to the Living Energy Farm Institute are tax deductible. To make tax deductible donations, do not go to the Virginia Organizing website, go here instead: https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1388125
Make sure to designate your donation for Living Energy Institute.
LEF August/September 2024
Living Energy Farm
August – September 2024 Newsletter
Speaking Tour Postponed — Many Thanks!
A number of people responded to our request to help us set up speaking events in the last newsletter. Thanks! We have realized however that we were moving too quickly. Other projects have been demanding our attention (see below), as has the farm. At this point, the speaking tour is officially postponed until the spring. We are deeply grateful for the folks who are trying to help, and regret we have not been better able to plan our time. Please stay in touch!
Solar Kits to North Carolina
As you probably know, hurricane Helene was a major disaster in western North Carolina. Entire towns have been wiped out, public infrastructure destroyed. Power is expected to be out for weeks in some areas. To help, we sent 43 of our 12AH solar battery kits to western NC with Veronica, a seed grower we know from the Ujamaa network, who is from Asheville and has connections with mutual aid networks in the area. The kits are small, but they can provide a few lights and charge phones, which is a whole lot better than nothing.
Most of the kits are being donated, while others are being sold at or below cost. We are fundraising to cover our costs, so we can replace this equipment and help more people in the future. Please consider donating if you can: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-lel-send-solar-kits-to-western-nc
We have a lot of friends and connections in the greater Asheville area. Western NC is a thriving hub for homesteaders, climate activists, and permaculturalists. Our friend Lucy, who came to our training in July, is a solar installer who works in and around Asheville. She had planned to spend a week with us this fall building Roxy Oven solar cookers to bring back to NC. Her house was flooded in the storm, but she still plans to come to LEF when she can. The need and desire for off-grid systems is greater than ever in Western NC, but it’s also a hard time to be installing any solar system. (The lithium kits we sent down are plug-and-play, but a full DC Microgrid takes time, skill, and a whole lot of parts to install. All these things are harder to come by in NC right now.) We will continue to encourage people pro-actively build resilient, off-grid renewable energy systems, before being forced to by a natural disaster. In the coming months and years we will probably have an eager audience in Asheville, NC.
Veronica (left) and Debbie with solar kits on their way to the mountains of western North Carolina.
The Easy Reaper Project Moving Forward
There have been two developments concerning the Easy Reaper- that’s our simplified combine harvester that we hope can help make small scale grain farming economically viable all over the world. We are getting ready to attend an event organized by the World Food Prize in Des Moines, Iowa at the end of October. We will have a prominent exhibit at a large conference attended by a lot of people–academics, equipment makers, all kinds of folks who are involved with supporting farmers all over the world. This could be an ideal opportunity to connect with people who could fund or manufacture Easy Reapers.
The current version of the Easy Reaper was made with scrap we could get our hands on. The main thresher drum was made with a very heavy oil drum. That was cheap and easy at the time, but also made for a very heavy machine to be transporting across the country. We are rebuilding the main thresher drum to make it lighter and more transportable. We are also improving the grain cleaning apparatus.
In cooperation with the University of Missouri, we are also moving forward with plans to build Easy Reapers in Africa. An African businessman (based in the U.S.) who has a long history of working with U.S. AID is working with us to make the combine drawings into Computer Aided Design (CAD). He will then start making Easy Reapers in Ethiopia. That’s also a big step forward. This machine could have substantial impacts in Africa, so we are working hard to update and improve the drawings and convert them to metric so the CAD can get finished.
Washing Machine
Our third prototype, simplified DC washing machine is operational. Thank you David! It uses a simple, upright stainless steel drum, and a commercial washing machine “impeller” at the bottom of the drum to wash the clothes. David put quite a bit of work putting the machine together, setting up the electronics to control the motor, as well as fill and drain valves.
We like this design. It’s very simple, very rugged, very well adapted to direct drive. It’s much better than our earlier, front loader style prototype in that it has a much smaller footprint, and it can be used indoors or outdoors, because it doesn’t splash water our like our previous model. This prototype does not in its current configuration have a spin cycle. Hanging drippy clothes is fine for a clothesline, though you would not want to do that with a tumble drier. The next step is to add belt guards, and standardize the electronics and production methods such that they are easier to make.
Spreading Direct Drive DC Microgrids
We continue to support solar direct drive projects in Puerto Rico with plans to do another education and installation trip in early 2025. Additionally, friend of ours who was involved in our first project at The Source Farm in Jamaica is now working with Wa Samaki permaculture center in Trinidad, and wants to incorporate DC Microgrids into their renewable energy and natural building curriculum. We are working to consult and support their work, and may visit their site in Trinidad to teach a workshop during their permaculture training next February. More on these projects as they move forward this winter.
We are also in the early stages of a potential housing project in Baltimore. There are a lot of abandoned row houses in Baltimore, and funding is available to revitalize that housing. The Waterbottle Co-op is a worker owned cooperative that has been re-habilitating abandoned row houses and renting them at modest rates. They already build to high insulation standards, and are very interested in energy independent housing. They are connected to a substantial network of organizations who train disadvantaged youth, provide low income housing, and work on climate change mitigation. Our vision for a collaboration with Waterbottle is to purchase several contiguous row houses, wrap them in a thermal shell and retrofit them with a full direct drive DC Microgrid, including solar thermal features and biogas production. For now we’re mostly working on identifying organizations that may be able to support and bring resources to the project. We are organizing a symposium of interested parties to be held in Baltimore in the middle of November.
We are also talking with nonprofits and organizers in our area (Louisa County) about doing energy independent, low income housing here. We will keep you posted.
Biogas
Our relationship with biogas continues to improve. September for us was relentless clouds and rain, almost not sun at all. Needless to say, that provides some challenges for our largely solar economy at LEF. Mostly, we are fine in such periods, though we do have to adjust — be more careful with water, turn off the internet router at night, etc. For cooking, we sailed right through with no trouble at all using biogas. Biogas has had a big impact on our quality of life. Being able to cook without any wood fires, especially first thing in the morning, is very nice. Our large biogas bag is making a big difference. We have lots of storage and the pressure is stable, regardless of weather or usage.
We have been talking to an organization called the Northeast Biogas Initiative. They are experimenting with using wood chips for insulation and a compost-based heating systems for their biogas digesters. We are looking at grants to document what we are doing, and to compare the short and long terms costs of different approaches (solar heat vs woodchips, etc). Then we will be better able to provide instruction for other people who want to use biogas for cooking or powering small tractors.
Our biogas tractor is also coming along. We built a filter that removes moisture and hydrogen sulphide (H2S). One pass through the filter and there was no measurable H2S in the gas at all. We are using a commercial product — pelletized iron oxide — to absorb the H2S. We have set up a small compressor and regulators to pressurize and de-pressurize the gas for use on the tractor. Finding natural gas carburetors for old, small engines is not easy. But we recently found a company that has developed a different approach. They sell a “snorkel” that slips in between the carburetor and the intake manifold so you don’t have to replace your carburetor at all to run biogas (see https://www.uscarburetion.com/).
Looks like a very smart idea. We will let you know how that works.
The Farm
The farm, and our farmers, are mostly doing well. We have finished harvesting most of our crops. The relentless rain has caused the loss of some fruit, but otherwise the farm did well this year. We planted our peanuts and sweet potatoes on beds this year, which helped them get through the wet weather. This week we brought in our finest sweet potato harvest yet. Our watermelon crop did not do as well as previous years. The Nikita persimmons did not make much, but the Rosseyankas will have a large harvest. Squash, okra, tomatoes, peppers and corn (all seeds crops) did well. We will almost certainly be running a biogas tractor next summer. We may or may not try to take the farm fully off of fossil fuel at that time, or that might have to wait another year. It will be exciting when we do.
Please support us if you can.
Living Energy Farm is a project to build a demonstration farm, community, and education center in Louisa County that uses no fossil fuels. For more information see our website
http://www.livingenergyfarm.org, or contact us at livingenergyfarm@gmail.com or Living Energy Farm, 1022 Bibb Store Rd, Louisa VA, 23093. Donations to the Living Energy Farm Institute are tax deductible. To make tax deductible donations, do not go to the Virginia Organizing website, go here instead: https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1388125
Make sure to designate your donation for Living Energy Institute.
Articles and videos about LEF:
Low-Tech Magazine (based in France) did a lengthy, well-researched article, largely about LEF, entitled Direct Solar Power: Off-Grid Without Batteries. It’s at https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2023/08/direct-solar-power-off-grid-without-batteries/
That article talks a lot about optimal utilization, translate “community is the magic bullet that makes renewable energy work.”
Matt Dhillon at Cville Weekly did one of the best brief summaries of LEF we have ever seen. The article is entitled Power Shift, Award-winning Living Energy Farm Makes Living Off-grid Sustainable. It is at https://www.c-ville.com/power-shift
Truthdig did an article on LEF by Megan McGee, an excellent review of our work in Puerto Rico. It is entitled Decolonizing Puerto Rico Through Solar Power. It’s at
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/decolonizing-puerto-rico-through-solar-power/
We continue to post new videos on Youtube. The latest is Solar Power Systems That Last
Forever, focused on our solar powered kitchen. See https://youtu.be/6XiHClx8d2Q
How to Never Pay an Electric Bill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5Wk7inoIxI&t=201s
This video is a walk-through of our energy systems at Living Energy Farm. It is a concise summary of how these systems work, and why they are not in common use already.
Solar Installations In The Navajo (Dine’) And Hopi Reservations, March 2020
http://livingenergyfarm.org/solar-installations-2020/
This is a photo essay about our project to bring durable solar energy systems to the Dine’ and Hopi Reservations, where thousands of people live without grid power involuntarily.
Support Living Energy Farm’s Climate Justice Campaign, and Bring DC Microgrids to People
Who Need Them
http://livingenergyfarm.org/support-our-climate-justice-campaign/
This is an updated web page describing our broader social justice ambitions.
How to Live Without Fossil Fuel (Introductory Video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri2U6u8p65E
Powering a Community with Solar Electricity (LEF has the only DC powered community that we know of, here’s how it works) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvdExgvHnRI&t=23s
The Best Way to Store Off-Grid Energy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wOxQ3sL9zc
Batteries that Last (almost) Forever https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfrgLsyFs0E
Virginia Homegrown created a program at LEF (the LEF part starts at the 29 minute mark in the program)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDGP0C9MIzU
International Permaculture has done 2 articles on LEF. One is in issue #93, Autumn 2017, and the second is in issue #94, Winter 2017. See https://www.permaculture.co.uk/
Article about LEF at the Atlantic Online Magazine
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/anarchism-intentional-communities-trump/513086/
Article about LEF in The Central Virginian
http://www.livingenergyfarm.org/cvarticle.pdf
LEF on CNN
http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2015/09/us/communes-american-story/
Cville weekly in Charlottesville VA
http://www.c-ville.com/off-grid-model-environmentalism-made-easy/#.VcHobF054yo
LEF June/July 2024
Living Energy Farm
June – July 2024 Newsletter
How to Bring Climate Change to a Screeching Halt
Conceptually at least, stopping climate change is not a difficult task. People need to live close enough to work so they don’t need a private car. If you live in a temperate climate, you need to live in a home where walls, solar space heating, and solar hot water systems are shared. It really helps to eat food that is primarily plant-based. Top that off with a DC Microgrid like we have at LEF, and you have a modern lifestyle at something like a 98% reduction in energy use compared to the average American.
Sound impossible? Well, in the coming decades, we are moving toward some industrial simplification whether we like it or not. But landing an airplane is very different than crashing one, though either way brings you back to the ground.
The tools we have developed at LEF are a live demonstration of how you can live in a
comfortable, energy independent home with modern conveniences. Our home is warm in winter, we take hot showers when we want, and we have ample electricity for lights and electronics. All of that is accomplished without grid power, nuclear, coal, natural gas, industrial “renewable” energy systems, a generator, or even much firewood.
We want to see our model grow. We want to start a movement that builds hundreds of cooperative housing projects and ecovillages powered by DC Microgrids. Imagine you live in one of these ecovillages. Your home looks much like a typical condo or apartment building, with thick walls that surround several units, big windows on the south and shade trees on the east and west, and solar collectors (both thermal and electric) on the roof. There are gardens and orchards south of the buildings. There’s no grid connection or propane tanks on site. Instead of paying electric and gas bills, residents pay a modest monthly fee to support a caretaker. That caretaker keeps the biogas digester fed, waters the batteries, and pops your dinner in the solar cookers before you come home from work. Then you get to enjoy your dinner in the company of the other people who live there, or in the privacy of your own unit. Over time, the residents become a community of people who know and support each other. If you get tired of it, you sell your unit and move on.
We need an alternative to the mass “electrification” plan that has turned into a mass deforestation program. Here in Louisa County VA, the local board has “limited” the solar deforestation of the county to “only” 3%. Taking down tens of thousands of acres of hardwood forests and paving them over to put up solar panels in the name of stopping climate change is very, very wrong, and has only a marginal impact (if any) on actually reducing fossil fuel use. We cannot hope to address the climate crisis with these supply-focused solutions alone, we need a demand-side solution that reduces energy consumption to the levels required by our ecological emergency.
WE NEED YOU. Living Energy Farm is a small organization. We are farmers, parents and
teachers, we are wizards of pipes, wires and things that whirrr, but we have not had the resources to promote our ideas all that much. Starting this fall we would like to do speaking events, to talk to people about ecological living at 2% of current resource use. We need you to help us get out (or connect online) with more people. So please help us set up events. Talk your friends, your church, or some strangers. Tell them we are for real. Find us a venue, or help us set up online meetings.
The goal is to help small groups of people in create entities that can build or retrofit cooperative homes using DC Microgrids. Where we are going could be a good place, but bringing people together to make that happen is going to be a challenge. We look forward to hearing from you.
DC Solar Training at LEF
In July, we hosted a four day DC Solar Training at LEF. We had a dozen focused, motivated people representing many exciting projects in Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. It certainly helped that the weather was perfect for the training. But that said, the infrastructure at LEF did not hiccup at all with a dozen extra people here. Everyone was fed. Everyone took showers and charged their devices at will. This training was focused, a bit shorter than prior trainings, but the group was very technically inclined and picked things up quickly. They were very enthusiastic about taking on challenging electrical projects, like converting appliances and building charging stations. After a few days of workshops, the group went over to Little Flower Catholic Worker (a small community 8 miles from LEF) to work on upgrading their DC Microgrid. We installed a 55AH 12V battery kit, and extended their 90V direct drive electrical supply into their kitchen so they could use the power for cooking (previously they were only using it to run their well pump).
Instead of asking people to pay for the event, we asked them to commit to helping with a socially worthwhile project. We discussed various projects and will look forward to seeing how that unfolds.
DC Appliance Conversion Workshop
Biogas
In the last newsletter, we were excited about our cheap air mattress biogas storage system. It seemed like a good idea, until they all started leaking. Darn. Biogas bags for sale in the U.S. are very expensive. We found a Chinese company that sold us a couple of quite large, very cheap biogas bags (Shenzhen Teenwin Environment Co., Ltd). As we head to print, we are plumbing those up and putting up a shed to house one large bag. Meanwhile, we have gotten some practice keeping Seymour (the biogas digester) under control. It’s fairly easy to push production up or down. If we cut off food and heat, biogas production tapers down over the course of a couple weeks. Turn on the heat and feed it, and it only takes a few days for biogas production to climb noticeably. We are pleased to realize how easy it is to produce more or less gas as we need it. We remain convinced that biogas, solar thermal, and solar direct drive photovoltaic power are the most accessible energy sources available for our sustainable future.
Horse Progress Days — Hanging Out with the Amish
The largest Amish gathering in the USA is an event called Horse Progress Days. The event focuses on horse drawn farming equipment, and there are many demonstrations of farm equipment. But the event is huge — well over 50,000 people in one very large field with massive tents, hundreds of vendors, and quite a festive atmosphere. The Amish are using a lot of solar energy at this point, primarily small, battery-based systems. We spoke to hundreds of people about direct drive DC energy.
The long term impacts of those interactions remains to be seen. The Budget newspaper — a paper read among the Amish — published an article about direct drive. The Amish are similar to LEF in some ways. They consciously limit their consumerism. They have farms and large families that function like small communities, and least in some ways. It seems like direct drive DC systems could be of benefit to them. If the Amish started using more direct drive DC systems, it would help the technology to spread.
In driving into the event area, we saw solar panels on many homes. We also saw quite a few very small horses. We were puzzled. The Amish are such practical people. What do they do with little horses that are too small to pull a plow or a buggy? Well, we got the answer at Horse Progress Days.
Those small horses are tended by the children, and hooked up to very small buggies that the children use to zip all over (think Amish drag racing). Thus the kids learn the skills to drive larger horses as they become adults.
Harvesting wheat with the combine that has one belt and eight spinning shafts.
Easy Reaper
We mentioned in the last newsletter that we were using our Easy Reaper — the simplified combine harvester. We harvested barley, oats, and more than an acre of wheat. We were enormously pleased. We have spoken to a few agricultural equipment manufacturers, and have not found anyone who wants to make Easy Reapers just yet. Our current plan is to keep working on them at LEF. We have been making some upgrades to our tooling to make that (and other projects) easier, though our shop is feeling pretty undersized at this point. We are trying to get pricing from some local fabricators who might make the drum and shell, which are the hardest parts for us to make. Meanwhile, we will probably be participating in a World Food Prize event called the Borlaug Dialogue. The dates are October 29 – 31 in Des Moines Iowa. That is a large event with thousands of participants from many academic, governmental and business entities. This may be a big opportunity for us to bring some attention to the project.
And, here’s a video of cutting wheat with the Easy Reaper.
The Farm
The farm is doing pretty well this year, although the rabbits ate most of the cantalopes, the deer went after over fence to get to the beans and peanuts, and did considerable damage to the watermelons. The birds ate a lot of the blueberries, and now a very large, and not very shy, black bear has taken to ripping the limbs off the pear trees and helping himself. Other than that, things are great.
We are canning lots of peaches. We have quite a bit of fruit in spite of the managerie of animals showing up at the dinner table. The corn crop is untouched thanks to Otto’s diligent efforts. Last fall, a landscaper brought us a huge pile of leaves.
Those are great for building soil, so we did some large scale sheet mulching. That was a mixed bag. The leaf mulch worked amazingly well with our spring potato crop, it was our best in years. The melons were more challenging; we should have transplanted them as the leaves tend to cool the soil and blow around a bit, which makes seed sprouting difficult. Then the rabbits showed up.
We are moving into the peak of harvest. Our seeds crops are a bit smaller than past years, but still some considerable work. We are looking forward to the persimmons, as well as making apple sauce, and perhaps some pear sauce, depending on the activities of the bear.
How many pears is a large black bear allowed to eat?
As many as he wants, apparently…
We look forward to hearing from folks who can help us set up speaking events.
Please support us if you can.
Living Energy Farm is a project to build a demonstration farm, community, and education center in Louisa County that uses no fossil fuels. For more information see our website
http://www.livingenergyfarm.org, or contact us at livingenergyfarm@gmail.com or Living Energy Farm, 1022 Bibb Store Rd, Louisa VA, 23093. Donations to the Living Energy Farm Institute are tax deductible. To make tax deductible donations, do not go to the Virginia Organizing website, go here: instead: https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1388125
Make sure to designate your donation for Living Energy Institute.
Articles and videos about LEF:
Low-Tech Magazine (based in France) did an lengthy, well-researched article, largely about LEF, entitled Direct Solar Power: Off-Grid Without Batteries. It’s at
https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2023/08/direct-solar-power-off-grid-without-batteries/
That article talks a lot about optimal utilization, translate “community is the magic bullet that makes renewable energy work.”
Matt Dhillon at Cville Weekly did one of the best brief summaries of LEF we have ever seen. The article is entitled Power Shift, Award-winning Living Energy Farm Makes Living Off-grid Sustainable. It is at https://www.c-ville.com/power-shift
Truthdig did an article on LEF by Megan McGee, an excellent review of our work in Puerto Rico. It is entitled Decolonizing Puerto Rico Through Solar Power. It’s at
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/decolonizing-puerto-rico-through-solar-power/
We continue to post new videos on Youtube. The latest is Solar Power Systems That Last
Forever, focused on our solar powered kitchen. See https://youtu.be/6XiHClx8d2Q
How to Never Pay an Electric Bill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5Wk7inoIxI&t=201s
This video is a walk-through of our energy systems at Living Energy Farm. It is a concise
summary of how these systems work, and why they are not in common use already.
Solar Installations In The Navajo (Dine’) And Hopi Reservations, March 2020
http://livingenergyfarm.org/solar-installations-2020/
This is a photo essay about our project to bring durable solar energy systems to the Dine’ and Hopi Reservations, where thousands of people live without grid power involuntarily.
Support Living Energy Farm’s Climate Justice Campaign, and Bring DC Microgrids to People
Who Need Them
http://livingenergyfarm.org/support-our-climate-justice-campaign/
This is an updated web page describing our broader social justice ambitions.
How to Live Without Fossil Fuel (Introductory Video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri2U6u8p65E
Powering a Community with Solar Electricity (LEF has the only DC powered community that we know of, here’s how it works) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvdExgvHnRI&t=23s
The Best Way to Store Off-Grid Energy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wOxQ3sL9zc
Batteries that Last (almost) Forever https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfrgLsyFs0E
Virginia Homegrown created a program at LEF (the LEF part starts at the 29 minute mark in the program)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDGP0C9MIzU
International Permaculture has done 2 articles on LEF. One is in issue #93, Autumn 2017, and the second is in issue #94, Winter 2017. See https://www.permaculture.co.uk/
Article about LEF at the Atlantic Online Magazine
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/anarchism-intentional-communities-trump/
513086/
Article about LEF in The Central Virginian
http://www.livingenergyfarm.org/cvarticle.pdf
LEF on CNN
http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2015/09/us/communes-american-story/
Cville weekly in Charlottesville VA
http://www.c-ville.com/off-grid-model-environmentalism-made-easy/#.VcHobF054yo
Living Energy Farm: Mixing Electrolytes for NiFe Batteries
Living Energy Farm recommends Nickel/Iron Batteries for backup use for off-grid living. If your batterie came dry or runs dry, here’s how to mix up the electrolytes for it.
The Leaves of Twin Oaks: Summer 2024
News of the Oaks by Valerie
Fire Recovery by Jason
Common Wealth Seed Growers by Zoe
Conference Announcements
News of the Oaks by Valerie
Our biggest news is that after a few years of low population, we are about to hit Pop Cap (our maximum population). If/when that happens, we’ll still be hosting our Visitor Program as per usual, but it may take a little longer for accepted Visitors to return.
Celebrations Our two big events recently were our annual Anniversary, with ex-members returning to help us celebrate Twin Oaks’ 57th year of existence; and also we hosted the wedding of community friends Ken and Irena, with a gathering including “Ken and Irena Jeopardy” and Ken’s brother who is an Episcopal priest officiating.
Sustainability: We’ve been busy with various projects. Our “eco-residence” that has 10 bedrooms, 2 living rooms and 1 bathroom off-grid, got an upgrade of new solar panels. 
Ex-member Debbie, now living at neighboring community Living Energy Farm helped install them.
We had several members take a literal field trip, to help harvest sweet potato slips at a farm we are connected with a couple of hours away. They were working with our sister community Acorn’s business Southern Exposure Seed Exchange and Ujamaa, a BIPOC-led organization that works to bridge the gap between prospective BIPOC seed growers and seed companies.
Summer Activities for Kids and their Kid-like friends: The “Twin Oaks Swim Team” is a group of kids and adults here who are dedicated to swimming in the pond every day! It’s a rotating cast of characters but has included Finley, Jessie, Nick, Indigo and Dave. Go team! Also a number of Twin Oaks kids are attending Shiloh Quaker Summer Camp an hour or two away from us. This year, several adults will also be participating in the camp as staff/support.
Second Edition: our member Pam Dawling, who has written two definitive books on farming/garden, has been hard at work on the second edition of her first book “Sustainable Market Farming”.
Fire Recovery by Jason
This March, a wildfire swept through parts of the community and destroyed our conference site, warehouse, sawmill, machinery, hammocks inventory and many other items vital to the economic self-sufficiency of the community. In the aftermath of the fire, we made the call to shut down the Hammocks business. With margins already thin in order to compete with overseas producers, and the loss of specialized equipment, making significant investments towards rebuilding seemed unlikely. We’ll finish up some hammocks using supplies which were off-site before the shop is converted into space for our Seed Racks business.
This is a blow to the community in both an economic and emotional sense. While the days of hammocks being our main source of income are long gone, the business sustained the community for many years, providing work and creating a much loved product that made a name for ourselves. While it is hard to say goodbye to this era of Twin Oaks, we are also looking at our community economy going forward. The Process Team kickstarted a “CommEcon” process, in which members submit proposals for new business ideas that the community could use to generate income. We will spend the summer deliberating proposals, and decisions about where to allocate resources will likely happen towards the end of the year.
Proposals include a pottery business, renewing our hammock-chair production, (but not regular hammocks), sewing textile goods, online teaching, tech support for local businesses, video game creation, building an eco AirBnB, and the expanding of the relationship between Twin Oaks and Common Wealth Seed Growers, a seed company run by one of our members with a focus on plant breeding and resilience in our seed systems. (see other article for more info on Common Wealth Seed Growers)
While we have not been able to start the cleanup efforts at EC yet due to the need for fire investigations, we have been able to start the cleanup and rebuilding of our conference site. A group of communards from our sister communities in Missouri will come to help, and we are hopeful that this work can progress quickly. We are planning on hosting a full slate of conferences this year, including the Communities Conference, Women’s Gathering, and Queer Gathering. (See links elsewhere in this issue for more info.)
Clean up at conference site.The forest is likewise beginning its process of recovery. The fire was quick burning, passing through areas quickly and consuming leaf litter, but not catching the trees. Many large trees show some charring around their base, but it appears that they will survive. Many of the smaller saplings did not leaf out, leaving an empty and brown understory, which contrasts with the untouched canopy, and the forest floor which is vigorously sprouting new life.
Ex-member Alexis-LEF was a firefighter and has been helping us prepare for another disaster. He installed the fire hose hookups near our residences some 30 years ago, which were instrumental in saving Tupelo. Since the fire, he has hosted a tour of our firefighting infrastructure, gotten us more firehose to place around the community, transformed our old tofu wastewater truck into a firetruck, and is advising us on forming our own fire brigade that can respond to fires on the property and direct the local firefighters on how to assist us.
Common Wealth Seed Growers by Zoe
While Edmund is one of the more renowned farmers at Twin Oaks, he rarely works in the main food garden. Rather, he manages several fields off the farm. He is part of Common Wealth Seed Growers, a cooperative project that produces and sells regionally-adapted, open-pollinated seeds. They only sell what grows well on their farms in Virginia, Tennessee and North Carolina. Common Wealth Seed Growers also use an open source seed promise for some of the seed varieties they’ve developed and their derivatives which promise to not restrict others’ use of the seeds they’ve developed or any of their derivatives to help combat corporate monopolization of seed varieties.
Edmund began breeding new produce variations back in 2011. Only three years later, Common Wealth Seed Growers received a Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education grant to identify downy mildew resistant strains in cucumber, melon and winter squash. They also received grants from the Organic Farming Research Foundation in 2018 and 2019 for similar research.
Edmund manages seed production as an income area for Twin Oaks. He sells seeds produced by Common Wealth Seed Growers, Southern Exposure Seed Exchange and other seed companies. Edmund envisions Common Wealth Seed Growers expanding in the future, and employing many more Twin Oaks members. As it is, Edmund does enlist a few Oakers in the process. Seed saving includes planting, nurturing, harvesting, cleaning, packing, and shipping – all of which are labor intensive. Thankfully, many here enjoy such work. Arguably, the most notable of these tasks is harvesting seed from squash and gourds – something that is best done by hand, and is always messy. Common Wealth Seed Growers pays Twin Oaks by the hour as ‘outside work’ for tasks done by members that aren’t directly agricultural such as marketing, website, and inventory management. In addition to providing money, seed production and research, the work provides an abundance of organic food for the community including cucumbers, bell peppers, cantaloupe and winter squash. This has allowed the community to dine on varieties we have never had before, such as the Guatemalan Green Ayote squash that has forest green innards and a sweet flavor. Visit commonwealthseeds.com to view or request their 2024 product catalog by mail and find out more information about their mission.
Conference Announcements
Twin Oaks Queer Gathering Friday August 2 – Sunday August 4
A weekend of queertranstastic fun, learning, workshops, networking, revelry, and more! twinoaksqueergathering.org
Twin Oaks Women’s Gathering Friday August 16 – Sunday August 18
An inclusive gathering of women celebrating ourselves in the woods.
womensgathering.org
Twin Oaks Communities Conference Friday August 30 – Monday September 2 (Labor Day Weekend) communitiesconference.org
If you live or want to live according to the values of cooperation and sustainability, this conference is for you. The conference focuses on intentional communities and on the larger cooperative movement.
Easy Reaper: First Harvest
Living Energy Farm has developed a new harvester they call “Easy Reaper”. Here’s a trial run.
Black Utopians, Sign, Community Threads, Bike, and Fennel
by Raven
It was an up and down week on Facebook, with a post from Serenity Solidarity scoring high and posts from Twin Oaks and Acorn not quite making it. (Posts from Twin Oaks and Acorn usually have high numbers and it’s often Serenity Solidarity, sadly, that struggles with the numbers.)
Serenity Solidarity posted about what they were reading.
I’m so pleased to report that this post did very, very well, with ten likes, one love, three comments, a share, and lovely two hundred and sixteen views.
On the other hand, I reposted from Twin Oaks about a handmade sign.
The sign is pretty, but the statistics were not. It got just one like and only ninety-four views.
That was bad but Acorn did worse. They posted a very appropriate poem with a nice picture.
Again, it seems sweet, but the stats were not. This got one love and only eighty-seven views.
But on to bigger and much, much better. East Wind Nut Butters (who are posting a lot more than the general community these days) celebrated Bike to Work Day.
This post did very well, with twelve likes, three loves (including one from East Wind Nut Butters!), and a hundred and eighty-five views.
And finally, another repost from Acorn, of a member dancing around a fennel plant. And this one did a lot better than the earlier post.
Unlike their previous poem and picture, this post did very, very well here with twelve likes, six love, two comments, and an amazing two hundred and thirty-nine views.
Easy Reaper
Alexis introduces the newest bit of technology from Living Energy Farm, a simplified combine harvester they call “Easy Reaper”.
commune life 