Solarpunk

I tried to create a community called buyitforlife (in part because !buyitforlife@lemmygrad.ml is apparently unreachable from here). When I click “create” the button spins for a moment but reverts back to a “create” button & nothing happens.

This was the sidebar I submitted:

For practical, durable and quality made products that are made to last.

Please be sure to tag your post based on topic in the post title.

• [Request]
• [Request - answered]
• [Discussion]
• [Review]
• [Repair]

Like !buyitforlife@lemmygrad.ml but copied here because for whatever reason lemmygrad is unreachable.

I don't think Solarpunk has normalised the idea that we could just routinely talk to animals.

Hi, I've been working on a few photobashes lately, of different scenes in a fictional solarpunk future. I recently started a scene of a solarpunk village. I’ve been thinking a lot about rural places lately, since that’s where I’m from, and how they might change with some of the societal crumbles and contractions I feel like are impending. In my grandparents’ time, the region where I grew up was lots of small villages, usually bunched up around water and local industry, with farms spread out beyond that. With cars, people have spread out in these sprawling bedroom communities that are becoming ever more dense with people. Gas and groceries are 40 minutes away by car (more if you're looking for a box store), and I feel like most people I knew drove an hour each way for work.

I wanted to do a scene sort of showing how things might change in rural areas if cars became impractical (due to shortages etc) and how things could be rebuilt better.

I've realized that this is a bit bigger in scope than most of the things I've depicted before. I'm trying to show most of a community in one shot here (albeit at a distance). And there's so much we could do differently, I don't really want to miss any ideas/opportunities.

I know I want to include the following:

• A dense village surrounded by farms and forest, an abandoned mcmansion or large house far enough out to be impractical
• High speed rail access to the village
• Solar panels
• Waterwheels
• Farms
• Algae farming
• Maybe a bit of an inside-out appearance where they've cleared farmland around the town but planted lots of trees between the buildings for cooling?

But when it comes to stuff like the layout and other societal-structure stuff, I don't really have any specifics in mind, which is why I feel like I should look for input from others rather than just drag along my own assumptions. As always I plan to emphasize reuse, so I can grab some existing bits and pieces of towns, but this'll be in the US where even the small towns aren't (in my experience) clumped this densely, so we have some flexibility with what the current residents have changed.

Here's the really rough version I currently have, so you can get an idea as to the general layout I'm planning for. The big green blank space and the surrounding woods etc is where the village and fields will go.

Sorry if I'm asking around too much, I posted to /c/farming yesterday for ideas for the fields (which I'm also happy to get) but I feel like a solarpunk society should be very consensus-driven, so it makes sense for depictions of it to be as well. I'll be doing smaller, simpler scenes for a bit after this one and should be more self-sufficient.

Researchers of the MIT developed a new solar powered passive water desalination system. They claim the system is low in maintenance and could produce water thst is cheaper than tap water.

This could be big for certain desert states and communities, who struggle with access to fresh water.

Following some recommendations on @solarpunk I picked up “The Dispossessed” by Ursula Le Guin, and I found it right up my alley. I went through it as fast as I could, unable to put it aside for long. There were a few aspects which I did not need (the Terran connection in particular messed with my suspension of disbelief), but overall I found it a very good start to dive into reading fiction again.

A nice article by the major German public broadcaster's news site. Translation by ChatGPT3.5:

The gloomy outlook on the future is countered by the genre Solarpunk: It creates online in art and literature a future worth living in, and one that might even be attainable.

Green meadows dotted with individual solar panels, with cows dozing in the shade. Floating balloons resembling turbines, with rotors generating electricity. Artificial cloud formations created above a small cultivation area that rains just enough to make the land fertile. Solar-powered, autonomously flying buses connecting the countryside with the city. It sounds like a utopia, a utopia of a world where people live in harmony with nature and use technology in a gentle manner.

These described scenes are from an anime that can be found on YouTube and represent a trend that has been growing in social networks in recent years: Solarpunk. It's a sustainable, green utopia expressed in art, design, and mostly in short stories and literature. Initially, it was primarily an internet phenomenon focused on aesthetics.

A Future in Harmony with Nature

The term "Solarpunk" emerged in 2008 through a blog post and initially described only a literary genre that evolved from science fiction, particularly climate fiction. This idea is not entirely new, especially when examining feminist science fiction from the 1970s. For example, in Marge Piercy's utopia "Woman on the Edge of Time," she sketched a world contrasting the sexist and racist present of that time. It depicted a world where racism and gender differences were abolished, and small collective communities engaged in environmentally conscious practices while using their advanced technologies to maintain their quality of life.

The term "Solar" symbolizes ecological sustainability, and "Punk" in this context represents rebellion, inclusion, diversity, and a counterbalance to capitalism. It's a counterproposal to the retro-oriented Steampunk and nihilistic Cyberpunk genres. Solarpunk aims to look forward with hope and counter the dystopian and post-apocalyptic narratives.

Instead, as noted by journalist Michael Förtsch, who is knowledgeable in the field of science fiction, the genre seeks to offer a positive or at least hopeful perspective on the future. A future where humanity strives to exist sustainably in harmony with the environment.

From Imagination to Reality

According to Förtsch, there are already approaches to this concept in our world today: "We can adapt our lives to better cope with climate change. We have technologies like solar and wind power, battery systems, and sustainable architecture. But we also have the opportunity to change our lifestyles and consumption habits by repairing devices, reducing waste, and producing food locally." This is the idea that artists in the Solarpunk genre embrace. "They are already envisioning that in the future, we will incorporate all these things into our lives."

Förtsch states that Solarpunk is already being lived today, with people making their homes or villages self-sufficient through solar power or coming together to operate communal gardens. Designers are also taking inspiration from the Solarpunk movement. "Efforts are being made to develop clothing that generates electricity or umbrellas covered in fabric with integrated solar cells that you could use to charge your smartphone via USB, for example."

Healthy, Realistic Hope Can Be Activating

This optimistic view of the future appears to be in stark contrast to Greta Thunberg's admonition, "I don't want you to be hopeful, I want you to panic," from her speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2019. Psychologist Lena Müller, who has been involved with "Psychologists for Future" since 2021, still regards Thunberg's statement as valid and believes that the activist was trying to jolt people out of their lethargy. "Because fear is indeed a mechanism or an emotion that is very activating."

However, Müller also believes that "healthy, realistic optimism" can help people when looking into the future. She has observed this in her work, where, for example, she assists people in workshops to better cope with their despair regarding climate change. "The goal of a climate movement is that we want to activate and motivate people to take action willingly." A sense of powerlessness due to fear can be inhibiting. One should not downplay the situation but also not be thrown off course by it.

Hope Through Technological Advances

Climate researcher Michael Jakob, who has been monitoring climate policy for years, also believes that hope can be activating. "It's not as if we will fall off a cliff if we exceed the target. Even if we have a warming of 2.3 degrees, it's still better than three or four degrees."

There will always be significant consequences, but they become more severe the higher the warming. "Fifteen years ago, the two-degree target sounded utopian, and the prospect of quickly transforming the energy system seemed distant." Much has happened since then. Jakob finds hope in various elements: "One is technological development. Renewable energies have become so affordable that they are now economically profitable on their own, without needing climate protection as the main motivation."

It's not a guaranteed success, but "we still have a chance to turn things around," says Jakob. He doesn't believe it's realistic to expect the entire society to enthusiastically embrace change. However, there need to be pioneers who demonstrate new possibilities and show that many things can be done differently while still having a good life. "I'm thinking of technologies, but also lifestyles, consumption patterns, and so on." Financial incentives and infrastructure must also be created so that this process does not harm people.

Vision through Science Fiction

Climate researcher Michael Jakob considers genres like Solarpunk to be very important because they create positive visions in culture, art, and literature. "Many of the innovations that have been groundbreaking in recent decades were envisioned many decades before. Last year, I read the book 'Neuromancer' by William Gibson, who detailed the concept of the internet in the 1980s. And Jules Verne, who essentially foresaw space travel."

Such visions are crucial, "so that we can imagine what the world could look like if we change," and not succumb to a state of "Climate Doom," which is despair, according to Jakob. It's necessary to believe that there are still opportunities for action.

love the move away from just seeing the choice for land use as solar or agriculture when it can be both, using the infrastructure of power generation to help protect growing plants could really help increase productivity for a small-holding especially when things like watering systems are tied into the PV infrastructure and we finally get round to taking advantage of roof space on things like barns.

I've seen some cool pictures of farms in arid regions using solar panels above irrigation to reduce evaporation too, i think solar mixed into where it's other properties are useful or where it's a good fit looks and works so much better than the neat rows of solar farms.

"There's more to life than culture, there's dirt and ... Get out ya labourer!"

I was wondering if y'all have some YouTube or podcast recommendations for solarpunk creators.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/2544266

I’ve been thinking a lot about how lifestyles, routines, and the overall pace of life might be different in a more solarpunk society. That, combined with some recent discussions and research into solar cookers made me want to try a scene of a solarpunk kitchen.

Specifically, I decided to render a summer kitchen, a fixture of old farmhouses around here, usually slung between the house and the barn, just a place where you could cook without heating up the rest of the house. They fell out of favor as stoves got more efficient, and they're a luxury for people with lots of space, but I think there's value in a spot where we can cook without making air-conditioning fight the oven. Seasonality may play a much bigger role in our lives in a more solarpunk world.

I pictured our summer kitchen as a kind of three-season porch or sunroom, somewhere you could grow herbs in the windows and overwinter less-hearty fruit trees. And maybe as we reconsider cooking around slower processes, in less hectic lives, add some seating for company (conventional wisdom has it that they're gonna hang around your kitchen either way, so we might as well build the space with that in mind). By building one wall mostly out of sliding doors (with bug netting I didn’t bother to show) we can open the space to cool it, and to reduce any risk of humidity building up from the greenhouse part and rotting the house.

There are a few benefits to this design, I think – in addition to cooling, by building the summer kitchen as an outcropping from the house, we add options for north-facing sides to point our south-facing Scheffler reflector at, making it easier to retrofit old houses. And if we have a south wall to work with, we can add a proper greenhouse wall to get the most out of our natural light. And if we’re building an addition anyways, we can add a root cellar underneath, for preserving vegetables and some fruits without the use of electricity. Once I had a basic layout in mind, I turned to the folks on the solarpunk community and included as many of their ideas as I could.

So, features of this kitchen of the future:

Solar oven: I borrowed the design (and the reflector) from Tamara Solar Kitchen. The big dish beside the house uses the curved, parabolic mirrors to concentrate light on a small opening on the firebrick north wall of the summer kitchen. This light bounces off an angled mirror so it enters the oven from underneath, allowing you to bake in the brick oven, or use the cast iron plate set into the top as a stovetop.

Several of these devices exist IRL and work just fine with only manual controls. But I included the computer control panel because I wanted to show that despite some of my other pictures and their emphasis on analog designs, there's a place for technology in a solarpunk society. Modern tech, without the corporate surveillance state, and focus on wasteful extraction, is a huge part of what I think can make solarpunk work. A lot of the older technologies I'm reexamining may benefit from or become viable with better sensors and automation.

For the screens, my head cannon is that they're old, out-of-support tablets, and the co-op that makes these setups flashed them with a custom ROM, essentially turning unsupported, insecureable tablets into secure, single-purpose devices. Making them less generally useful, perhaps, but still extending their service life far beyond what their manufacturer intended. A motoring system that helps you keep track of your mirror and makes sure it’s not cooking the wrong part of your house would be a good thing to have.

Solar hot water: on the roof, another opportunity to use sunlight directly, and to make the most of our south-facing roof.

Pedal-powered appliances: This was a recommendation from the instance which would not have occurred to me, though I’ve used old pedal-powered grindstones before. I built these ones into the bar both because it made for easy access/maintenance, and because I wonder what 'keeping up with the Joneses' looks like in a solarpunk future, I think in any society, no matter what its values are, there will be people who go way out of their way to demonstrate those values, and I could see things like this being used as statements. This is largely remixed from a real thing a design student made, though I modified the pedal system so it would use a step set under the counter, rather than the version that stuck out the side, as I felt like I’d kick that thing whenever I walked past the bar.

Root cellar: another idea from the group, and something the people living here could benefit from all year long. You might notice that the refrigerator is missing. We talked a bit about perhaps modifying a propane-driven camper fridge to run off a solar cooker, but ultimately I decided they probably have one refrigerator, maybe set up like a chest freezer for maximum efficiency, back inside the winter kitchen.

Fermenting kit: another option for preservation and a fun hobby and another idea from the group. They might be making beer, or soy sauce, or any of a bunch of things. Similarly, I included a shoebox tempeh incubator on the counter as well.

As for making the image itself, these more realistic-looking ones take a lot more time as I can’t rely on filters or other stylizations to hide details. But I wanted this one to be detailed. While I was planning this one, I referenced some of the AI art out there of solarpunk kitchens for visuals I liked – the very fancy dark wood, red accent walls, and bright sunlight streaming in were elements I reused here. But one thing I think that sets this apart, besides the ideas I want to demonstrate, is that you can zoom in on this and really look at the bits and pieces, and they hopefully make sense. Someone (me) had to find and cut out all the jars and plants and nicknacks. There’s a reason that they’re there. Hopefully the version of the image you’re seeing still has enough detail to allow you to do that, if not let me know and I’ll find a way to send the high rez version.

I’ll say here that the stained glass windows and the carved wood panels were contributed by a friend’s midjourny bot.

One last note: buildings in a solarpunk world are going to vary drastically based on local conditions. Building in cooperation with our surroundings is one way to really cut our consumption of resources. This kitchen is built for North America because that’s what I know. Other continents, other longitudes, other climates, will call for much different designs. I’d love to see those if anyone can depict them.

And, like the other Postcards from a Solarpunk Future, this image is CC-BY, meaning you can use it for whatever you like. I'm not sure how, in-world, this ended up as a postcard, maybe the homeowners won a contest or made it to the cover of a homesteading zine or something.

The goal of this project is to gather strategies, skills, disciplines, technologies, ideas, designs and critical thought in an effort to help prepare communities big and small for a time of great upheaval, an era of collapses (plural). It is not a submission to 'The Collapse' and nor does it seek to romanticise an end times. Within this frame, individual-centered survivalist and prepper cultures are not encouraged, while we identify that both hold much that may be of use to communities facing tough times.

Not my OC but what I've believed for years: there's no conflict between reducing your own environmental impact and holding corporations responsible. We hold corps responsible for the environment by creating a societal ethos of environmental responsibility that forces corporations to serve the people's needs or go bankrupt or be outlawed. And anyone who feels that kind of ethos will reduce their own environmental impact because it's the right thing to do.

Thoughts?

I think it's a step forward. A small step but a step. Getting kids any entry level job is a good thing these days, setting them up for careers in climate positive sectors is even better, and I personally like anything that moves us closer to the New Deal 😆

I am not sure what I am looking for, but I am interested in solar punk and am looking for books!

It could be fictional (scifi/fantasy/whatever) or more technical..

Troglodytus Asteroidea via Sunnyside up

It’s too late to save the world

Ash trees sprout in cracks in the asphalt. The gutters collect leaves, which become soil, in which dandelions sprout.

There’s nothing you can do

A man plants an entire forest. A young girl teaches a drone to deliver saplings. The elderly volunteer to clean up radioactive waste.

You might as well give up

Wolves return to ancestral hunting grounds. Bison return to the prairie. Otters return to the kelp beds. Young oaks push roots deep into reclaimed farmland.

Who cares anyway?

Children draw pictures of flowers. Festivals are held for cherry blossoms and pecans and apples. A crowd cheers as the last line is cut away from the ensnared creature.

I have disobeyed worse than you
The world does not die on my watch

I'm sketching another photobash, this time a scene of a solarpunk kitchen, and I wanted to make sure I didn't miss an opportunity to include something cool.

My current plan is for this one to be a kind of summer kitchen (like old farmhouses around here used to have) which doubles as a three season porch. I think a lot of the elements could fit a normal kitchen, but some will compliment each other well with this design so it might be a good place to start (and it fits my theme of reexamining older ways of doing things for opportunities to reuse).

My current list of elements:

• a Tamara Solar Kitchen -style oven cooker

• A glass wall (and bit of roof) for growing plants and overwintering sensitive fruit trees

• A solar hot water rig on the roof

• Some sort of plan for compost (currently just a resealable bucket on a counter, but for those of you who know more about composting, I'm happy to build in your dream system)

• A sitting area since people always hang out in the kitchen while you're cooking anyways.

• Maybe a parabolic grill set up outside, we'll see if that feels redundant.

I feel like I'm missing a bunch of opportunities, so if you have any ideas, now's a great time to add stuff

Shared from r/solarpunk on Reddit because it's beautiful and because I can

Genetically modified bacteria may eat up ocean plastic waste

"Mainstream" isn't a good label in my book, but I like the enthusiasm 👍

Frankly, I think it would be foolish to expect any fossil fuel reserves to stay in the ground. Corporations are immortal, corporations own lots of drilling tools, and as long as there is profit to be made in mining and burning fossil fuels, corporations will do it, the Earth be damned.

A lot of solarpunk visions and ideas basically take our current culture and add more solar panels and respect for life. Which isn't bad, I appreciate it. But the world we can expect is far different from today:

• temperatures will be 14 to 20 above the current average
• Sea levels are hundreds of feet higher
• almost every one of today's major cities is underwater
• Greenland and Antarctica are ice-free and temperate
• all land masses with currently tropical climates are lifeless deserts, literally too hot for photosynthesis much of the year

So - presuming we don't trigger a runaway greenhouse effect and turn into a second Venus - what do you think the world will look like a few hundred years from now after everything's been burned? What kind of societies would form in the wake of such utter disaster?

With 10 to 20 billion climate refugees fleeing every coast and every tropical landmass on Earth, do you think a global war for land is inevitable?

How would you imagine keeping the flame of hope alive through such a war?

Or how would you change society so that the worst refugee crisis in human history - now inevitable - brings people together instead of tearing them apart?

Is the long term solarpunk strategy to build a space colony and repopulate the Earth after it burns to ash?

What does a sustainable society look like when all the fossil fuels have been burned and all the damage had been done? And how do we get there?