Taos Earth Ship

Earthship in Taos, New Mexico

 

When daughter lived in Taos, New Mexico, she lived in an Earthship on Michael Reynolds' property in town.  Michael Reynolds, creator of the Earthship, rented her the first Earthship he ever built at a very reasonable rate!  Her house was built into the ground and had a greenhouse across the front that also served as a bathroom. 
Earthships are designed to catch and use water from the local environment without bringing in water from a centralized source. Water used in an Earthship is harvested from rain, snow, and condensation. As water collects on the roof, it is channeled through a silt-catching device and into a cistern. The cisterns are positioned so they gravity-feed a WOM (water organization module) that filters out bacteria and contaminants and makes it suitable for drinking. The WOM consists of filters and a DC-pump that are screwed into a panel. Water is then pushed into a conventional pressure tank to create common household water pressure.
Water collected in this fashion is used for every household activity except flushing toilets. The water used for flushing toilets has been used at least once already: frequently it is filtered waste-water from sinks and showers, and described as "Greywater".

We visited the Earthship Visitor Center and subdivision in Taos.  The earthships we saw there were much more modern and developed than the one in which she lived.

Earthship® is a registered trademark by Michael Reynolds, that refers to a type of passive solar house made of natural and recycled materials (such as earth-filled tires), designed and marketed by Earthship Biotecture of Taos, New Mexico.
Earthships are primarily designed to work as autonomous buildings using thermal mass construction and natural cross ventilation assisted by thermal draught (Stack effect)to regulate indoor temperature. Earthships are generally off-the-grid homes, minimizing their reliance on public utilities and fossil fuels.  Earthships are built to utilize the available local resources, especially energy from the sun. For example, windows on sun-facing walls admit lighting and heating, and the buildings are often horseshoe-shaped to maximize natural light and solar-gain during winter months. The thick, dense outer walls provide thermal mass that naturally regulates the interior temperature during both cold and hot outside temperatures.
Internal, non-load-bearing walls are often made of a honeycomb of recycled cans joined by concrete and are referred to as tin can walls.  These walls are usually thickly plastered with adobe. The roof as well as the north, east and west facing walls of an Earthship are heavily insulated to prevent heat loss.

You can read more about Earthship Biotechture at earthship.com.