Original, integrated designs for living better with less impact
Our goal is to help people live healthy, enjoyable, and meaningful lives, by helping with the nuts and bolts of simple, sustainable systems that really work, for water supply, greywater reuse, fire safe architecture, active transportation, etc
These designs can be used a-la-carte, or fully integrated and optimized for your context, enabling you to live well with as little as 90% less resource use than the average American.
You'll find info here on 35 years of original innovations, some of which have spread worldwide, adopted in building codes, etc.. Much of our content is extensively re-posted on the Web; this is the source: More than500 pages of original on-line content plus books which are top in their categories.
—The Oasis Team
"Just wanted to thank you for getting those books out...as I opened the package I had the opportunity to pass your info along to an interested client. Person to person that's how this revolution is spread" —Jaime, New Mexico
We developed the Laundry to Landscape Greywater System in 2008 and published it unpatented into the public domain. The new, 6th edition of Create an Oasis with Greywater (Oct 2015) includes extensive information on this system.
The Laundry to Landscape system is the simplest, least expensive, lowest effort way to get the most greywater to the home landscape most effectively. It has been widely adopted, accommodated in building codes, the subject of numerous government rebates, DIY workshops, and government training. It is the grey water system most suited for professional installation by landscapers. Most homes in arid areas or on septic tanks should have one of these.
We developed the Branched Drain Greywater System and published it unpatented into the public domain in May 2000.
Branched drains provide economical, reliable, sanitary, low-maintenance distribution of household greywater to downhill plants without filtration, pumping, or surge tanks. The up-front investment (primarily in labor) is substantial but then the system requires little attention and can last the lifetime of the house. Maintenance is generally annual. In contrast, most other systems cost more, lack the opportunity to save much by doing the labor yourself, and require significant ongoing inputs of electricity, frequent maintenance, and replacement.
Water supply is the first order of business for any human settlement. Storage is a key component of water security.
Storage can be used to: cover peaks in demand, smooth out variations in supply, provide water security in case of power loss, supply interruptions or disaster, save your home from fire, meet legal requirements, improve water quality, provide thermal storage and freeze protection, and enable a smaller pipe to serve for a distant source. Water Storage--the #1 selling plumbing book on-line for several years--considers each of these reasons to store water, then looks at design principles to help you frame the goals for your water project and how to realize them.
The central paradox of greywater design is 1) greywater is not very consequential in itself; and 2) to get the greywater just right, you need to get most everything else right, which is highly consequential.
On top of this, greywater is far more context sensitive and interconnected with other systems than just about any other green building practice. Facing these challenges, there is a set of common errors that people naturally make over and over again. This article explains each common mistake and points the way to preferred practices.
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