The Printed Website: Volume III & The Comments
Low-tech solutionsThe printed archives of Low-tech Magazine now amount to four volumes with a total of 2,398 pages and 709 images.
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The Revenge of the Hot Water Bottle
Obsolete TechnologyImagine 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.
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Fascine Mattresses: Basketry Gone Wild
Obsolete TechnologyAround 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.
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How to Build a Low-tech Solar Panel?
Low-tech solutionsGeorge 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.
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How to Design a Sailing Ship for the 21st Century?
Low-tech solutionsIt 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.
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Urban Fish Ponds: Low-tech Sewage Treatment for Towns and Cities
Obsolete TechnologyIn 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.
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How Sustainable is High-tech Health Care?
High-tech ProblemsCan 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?
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Vertical Farming Does not Save Space
High-tech problemsIf 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.
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How and Why I Stopped Buying New Laptops
High-tech ProblemsBeing an independent journalist – or an office worker if you wish – I always reasoned that I needed a decent computer and that I need to pay for quality.
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How to Make Biomass Energy Sustainable Again
Obsolete TechnologyFrom the Neolithic to the beginning of the twentieth century, coppiced woodlands, pollarded trees, and hedgerows provided people with a sustainable supply of energy, materials, and food.
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Thermoelectric Stoves: Ditch the Solar Panels?
Low-tech SolutionsWood stoves equipped with thermoelectric generators can produce electricity that is more sustainable, more reliable, and less costly than power from solar PV panels.
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Fruit Trenches: Cultivating Subtropical Plants in Freezing Temperatures
Obsolete TechnologyDuring the first half of the twentieth century, Soviet citrologists grew (sub)tropical plants in temperatures as low as minus 30 degrees Celsius – outdoors, and without the use of glass or any fossil fuel-powered assistance.
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How Sustainable is a Solar Powered Website?
Low-tech SolutionsWe present our website’s energy and uptime data, calculate the embodied energy of our configuration, consider the optimal balance between sustainability and server uptime, and outline possible improvements.