As we’re writing this we’re basking in glorious sunshine. So it’s a good time to share our journey so far in bringing sustainable hot water to the tipis and yurts.
With assistance from Sustainable Tourism Powys last year we installed a compost hot water system for each tipi and yurt. This basically consisted of about 30m of black pipe full of water coiled up inside a compost heap.
Compost Coil
The inspiration came from Jean Pain, a French innovator who created all of his heating needs from compost. The theory is simple – as compost decomposes it releases heat. There’s a fine balance to attain between the amount of ‘brown’ compost (dried leaves, woodchips etc.) and ‘green’ compost (fresh plants, in particular for us grass cuttings) to ensure that enough heat is released but that the temperature remains steady. Our project felt blessed as the very day that we decided to go ahead with this system we found a plentiful source of woodchips which were even delivered to our home! We gathered trailer-loads of grass cuttings from a local caravan park and soon we had all we needed for the compost heaps.
Once we were up and running and within a day or so each compost heap was heating the water to about 40 degrees, which was great for a warm/hot shower. But alas, while we had hoped that the water would be hot for a good few months we only managed to get decent heat for a couple of weeks. The grass cuttings certainly gave off heat but they do this very quickly over a short period. Probably the system would work if we had a different source of green compost, or simply bigger piles. But having moved about two and a half trailers of woodchips and grass to each tipi/yurt we really didn’t feel it was viable to keep bringing more compost on a regular basis.
So we’ve now changed our system into solar-powered hot water. The black pipes are laying coiled facing towards the sun and after about half an hour of strong sun (or an hour of mild sun) you can have a lovely warm shower with fresh water from the spring up the hillside. No more need to be shovelling woodchips and grass – just let Grandfather Sun do the hard work! …And for the cloudier days there is still a back-up warm shower system using hot water from the kettle and a hand pump water container – the wonders of modern technology!
