Garbage+Warrior

Garbage Warrior Garbage warrior, by Oliver Hodge, released in 2007, follows the struggles of architect Michael Reynolds to build his sustainable housing. Michael lives and works in New Mexico designing and building what he call “Earth ships.” His designs use less traditional design and materials for construction, like using plastic bottles, glass bottles and even beer cans as bricks. Diverting waste from landfills and putting it do good use. He has built several houses of roughly the same basic design, all of which are self heating, self watering, and have self contained waste water. The technology and materials exist for the building of sustainable housing; he wants to show the world that we can life sustainably and within our means.

By using old tires packed with dirt, as a source of “bio-mass” which when heated by the sun, can maintain a house at a comfortable seventy degrees year round. During one of his housing experiments the house held the heat so well that it melted the plastic from the residence typewriter. By using this concept of bio-mass he has been leaving in a house without a heater for twenty years with no heating bill.

But with all that is good about his houses, the New Mexico state government has a problem the design, do to safety regulations. The state took his architecture license away when he did not have a “proper” sub-development. This halted his progress, stopping his design work. In 2004, when the Thailand tsunami hit, the people of Thailand were in trouble. They had no housing, limited access to clean water and needed help rebuilding. Reynolds and his team left for Thailand to help in the relief effort. Reynolds and his team helped to build sustainable housing that not only was built from local materials and collected clean rain water for the locals to consume. They loved that they could take care of themselves, and had the tools to build sustainable housing. Reynolds and his team are even preparing to revisit Haiti in January of next year to aid in the building of housing (Earth Ship, 2010).

Back in the states, Reynolds could not build his houses here. In order to continue his practice in the states, he proposed legislation to create ‘testing grounds” for houses, just like we have with testing grounds for bombs. Over the course of four years, he eventually got the bill passed, but not with jumping through political downfalls, proving that politics get in the way of sustainability. This film was very eye opening. From the humanitarian effort, to the basic concept of Reynolds houses, it was inspiring. This film would most likely be appreciated by a more mature and educated crowd, most likely high school and the younger end of the spectrum. Standards of living don’t need to change drastically in order to life sustainably, and I think that this is best shown through Reynolds work which can be seen through all of his work.

For more information on Reynolds and his work

Earth Ships [|https://earthship.com]

Article: If the Titanic is Sinking Is Dress Code Important? [] =Bibliography= Hodge, Oliver. (Director). Garbage Warrior. [Motion Picture] http://www.garbagewarrior.com/ Earth Ship. (2010, January). //Earth Ship//. Retrieved November 10, 2010, from Hatit Diaster Relief: https://earthship.com