Cycling is the most sustainable form of transportation, but the bicycle is becoming increasingly damaging to the environment. The energy and material used for its production go up while its life expectancy decreases. Illustration: Diego Marmolejo. Cycling is sustainable, but how sustainable is the bicycle? Cycling is one of the most sustainable modes of transportation. Increased ridership reduces fossil fuel consumption and pollution, saves space, and improves public health and safety. However, the bicycle itself has managed to elude environmental critique. [1] [2] Studies that calculate the environmental impact of cycling almost always compare it to driving, with predictable results: the bicycle is more sustainable than the car. Such research may encourage people to cycle more often but doesn't encourage... Continue reading

The bicycle and the bow are both highly efficient, human-powered technologies that could substitute for two very harmful alternatives: the car and the firearm. Why do we promote one but not the other? Image: University of Chicago students practice archery. Image by Bardon, Emmet. University of Chicago Library, Special Collections Research Center. Why did firearms and bullets replace bows and arrows? To many, this sounds like a stupid question with an obvious answer: the firearm succeeded the bow because it’s a superior weapon. Let’s investigate. Strength and skills Hand-held firearms are usually assessed or compared in terms of performance characteristics such as lethality, range, and rate of fire. However, if we apply the same criteria to bows, two difficulties quickly... Continue reading

While manufacturing modern firearms and bullets depends on a global supply chain and fossil fuels, bows and arrows can be made anywhere out of anything, using only human power and simple hand tools. Image: Tanimber islander with very large bow and arrow in leather armor, Dutch Indies. Source unknown. Many bows and arrows ago The bow is one of humanity's most essential and fascinating technologies, perhaps only eclipsed by the controlled use of fire. Despite endless academic speculation on the subject for almost 200 years, we don't know when archery originated. [1] Bows and arrows were made from organic materials, which do not preserve for long. The oldest archaeological finds come from peat bogs, glaciers, and water-logged lake sediments –... Continue reading

We built a pedal-powered generator and controller, which is practical to use as an energy source and exercise machine in a household — and which you can integrate into a solar PV system. We provide detailed plans to build your own, using basic skills and common hand tools. Image: The bicycle generator in the living room. CONTENTS ARTICLE Introduction The bike generator Why a vintage exercise bike with flywheel? How much power does it produce? The art of pedal power: what are the challenges? Matching the voltage Matching the current Charging batteries The dashboard: how to address these challenges? Matching the voltage: buck and boost converters Matching the current: switchable circuits and dimmers How to use the bike: experiments Corded... Continue reading

Imagine a personal heating system that works indoors as well as outdoors, can be taken anywhere, requires little energy, and is independent of any infrastructure. It exists – and is hundreds of years old. The hot water bottle could save a great deal of energy and money without sacrificing thermal comfort. Hot water bottles work both indoors and outdoors. Illustration: Marie Verdeil. A hot water bottle is a sealable container filled with hot water, often enclosed in a textile cover, which is directly placed against a part of the body for thermal comfort. The hot water bottle is still a common household item in some places – such as the UK and Japan – but it is largely forgotten or... Continue reading

The printed archives of Low-tech Magazine now amount to four volumes with a total of 2,398 pages and 709 images. All books are printed on demand. Low-tech Magazine Volume III The newest Low-tech Magazine book collects 18 articles published between 2018 and 2021. It sells for 22.50 euro ($24.99) in the Lulu bookstore. At 368 pages it’s a thin book compared to earlier volumes. When we started the book series, the challenge was to unlock an archive of almost 12 years. It made sense to pack this content into as few volumes as possible. However, looking ahead, we will publish more often, once every one to three years, depending on the number of articles written. From now on, the articles... Continue reading

Around the 17th century, the Dutch started reinforcing their dykes and harbours with sturdy mats the size of football pitches – hand-woven from thousands of twigs grown on nearby coppice plantations. These “fascine mattresses” were weighted with rocks and sunk into canals, estuaries, and rivers. This article contains many images and would be a 12.1 MB download from this website. Therefore, I kindly invite you to read the article on our solar powered website, where it has been compressed to 1.90 MB. Continue reading

George Cove, a forgotten solar power pioneer, may have built a highly efficient photovoltaic panel 40 years before Bell Labs engineers invented silicon cells. If proven to work, his design could lead to less complex and more sustainable solar panels. Above: George Cove stands next to his third solar array. Source: "Generating electricity by the sun's rays", Popular Electricity, Volume 2, nr. 12, April 1910, pp.793. More efficient, less sustainable Ever since Bell Labs presented the first practical solar PV panel in the 1950s, technological development has focused on reducing costs and increasing the efficiency of solar cells. According to these standards, researchers have made a lot of progress. The efficiency of solar panels increased from less than 5% in... Continue reading

Als mevrouw Carmen (75) opendoet gaat haar bezoek net weg. Twee vriendinnen komen na een bezoek aan de markt wekelijks even op de koffie. Ze woont al bijna 30 jaar aan de Jan Kobellstraat, pal aan het Grote Visserijplein. Aan de knusse woonkamer grenst de eetkamer, die kan worden afgesloten... Continue reading

It is surprisingly difficult to build a carbon neutral sailing ship. This is even more the case today, because our standards for safety, health, hygiene, comfort, and convenience have changed profoundly since the Age of Sail. On board the ship `Garthsnaid' at sea. A view from high up in the rigging. Image by Allan C. Green, circa 1920. The sailing ship is a textbook example of sustainability. For at least 4,000 years, sailing ships have transported passengers and cargo across the world’s seas and oceans without using a single drop of fossil fuels. If we want to keep travelling and trading globally in a low carbon society, sailing ships are the obvious alternative to container ships, bulk carriers, and airplanes.... Continue reading

‘Energieverbruik in Nederland is veel hoger dan in andere delen van de wereld. Wat wij in Nederland energiearmoede noemen, is in vergelijking hiermee nog altijd decadent,’ stelt Kris de Decker bij aanvang van de tweede Energie Agora van het Huis van de Toekomst. Deze keer gaat het over uitputting en... Continue reading

In the mid 20th century, whole cities' sewage systems safely and successfully used fish to treat and purify their water. Waste-fed fish ponds are a low-tech, cheap, and sustainable alternative to deal with our own shit -- and to obtain high protein food in the process. Image: Fish ponds in the East Kolkata Wetlands – the largest sewage-fed aquaculture system in the world today. Source: Edwards, 2008. [8] After we eat and drink, we excrete into toilets, which use water to flush our effluent into municipal sewage systems. By and large, the resulting sewage is either untreated, or treated in different kinds of wastewater treatment plants, the most advanced of which are expensive to run and have high energy demands.... Continue reading

Ons brood kopen we tegenwoordig in de supermarkt, maar het kan ook anders. Voor het Huis van de Toekomst bouwde Bart Groenewegen een bakoven in de gemeenschappelijke achtertuin. Elke week wordt er brood gebakken voor alle buren. Het duurt wat langer dan even naar de supermarkt lopen, maar het brood... Continue reading

In Nederland vinden we centrale verwarming op gas heel gewoon. We verwarmen het volledige volume aan lucht in een ruimte om het lekker warm te hebben. Maar vroeger deden we het helemaal anders: we verwarmden geen ruimtes, maar mensen. Dat is veel energie-efficiënter. De voetenstoof is een Nederlands voorbeeld. Het... Continue reading

Het is een bitterkoude winterdag en Silvia Busby is warm gekleed in een behaaglijk huispak. De lichtgrijze kitten Shinzu volgt haar nieuwsgierig naar de woonkamer in de bovenwoning in de Rosener Manzstraat, waar ze nu vier jaar woont. “Relatief kort als je het met de anderen hier vergelijkt. Hiervoor woonde... Continue reading

Zijn werkende leven vat Michael Siem (1960) als volgt samen: "Ik heb alles gedaan, van a tot z." Hoewel hij het nu naar eigen zeggen rustig aan doet, heeft hij nog altijd meerdere ijzers in het vuur, die volledig op mond-tot-mond reclame draaien. Hoewel de technische duizendpoot geen arbeidscontract heeft,... Continue reading

If the electricity for a vertical farm is supplied by solar panels, the energy production takes up at least as much space as the vertical farm saves. Urban agriculture in vertical, indoor “farms” is on the rise. Electric lights allow the crops to be grown in layers above each other year-round. Proponents argue that growers can save a lot of agricultural land in this way. Additional advantages are that less energy is needed to transport food (most people live in a city) and that less water and pesticides are required. Which crops? The vertical farms that have been commercially active for several years all focus on the same crops. These are agricultural products with a high water content, such as... Continue reading

Can we make modern health care carbon-neutral and maintain the levels of care, pain relief, and longevity that we have come to take for granted? The surgeon, a painting by David Teniers, 1670s. The environmental footprint of the health care sector Health care is one of the most important economic sectors in high income countries, but its environmental footprint is underreported and not often considered. Most research into sustainable health care is less than five years old. A 2019 research paper calculated that the sector accounts for 2-10% of national carbon footprints across all OECD countries, China, and India, with an average share of 5.5% overall. [1-2] The data refer to the year 2014, when the health care sectors of... Continue reading

Life in the first climate-neutral neighbourhood in the Netherlands is largely determined by the weather and the seasons. Collage: Golnar Abbasi & Arvand Pourabbasi. Lees dit artikel in het Nederlands. Reliability vs. Sustainability Fossil fuels are available on demand: we can use them whenever we want to. This has brought... Continue reading

Het dagelijkse leven in de eerste klimaatneutrale wijk van Nederland wordt grotendeels bepaald door het weer en de seizoenen. Betrouwbaarheid & duurzaamheid Fossiele brandstoffen zijn op afroep beschikbaar: ze kunnen worden ingezet wanneer we maar willen. Dat heeft ons een maatschappij gebracht waarin het weer en de seizoenen niet langer... Continue reading

‘Vierhonderdduizend jaar gebruikte de mens duurzame energiebronnen: spierkracht en vuur. Alleen de laatste zeventig jaar gas. En nu gaan we weer van het gas af.’ Kris De Decker geeft energiegeschiedenisles in de eerste Energie Agora van het Huis van de Toekomst. Online, want corona. ‘Niet ideaal, niet al onze buren... Continue reading

Hans Koedood (1949) woont in zijn eentje aan de Rösener Manzstraat in een woning zonder meubels. Hij leeft vanuit zijn slaapkamer, waar hij onder zijn deken tv kijkt of een boek uit de bibliotheek leest. Behalve een televisie en een magnetron bezit Hans geen elektrische apparaten. En de verwarming gaat... Continue reading

Audry Wilson (1971) was negentien toen ze uit Curaçao naar Rotterdam emigreerde. Ze woonde aan de Schoonderloostraat in Delfshaven, waar ze haar eerste kind kreeg. Vijftien jaar later, met het vierde (en laatste) kind op komst, verhuisde ze naar een grotere vijfkamerwoning aan de Rösener Manzstraat in Bospolder-Tussendijken. Vier jaar... Continue reading

Kom je Jawad Shiamizadeh tegen, dan begint hij ongetwijfeld een praatje. Voor je het weet ben je een kwartier verder en heeft hij je de halve geschiedenis van Iran voorgeschoteld. Voordat hij selfmade historicus werd, heeft Jawad in de kracht van zijn leven al zijn energie in de Rotterdamse haven... Continue reading

The first carbon-neutral district in the Netherlands says no to modern healthcare, which is completely dependent on fossil fuels. Yet the inhabitants are just as healthy as other Dutch people. Collage: Golnar Abbasi & Arvand Pourabbasi. Lees dit artikel in het Nederlands. How sustainable is modern healthcare? Modern healthcare is... Continue reading