This will likely be my last winter solarpunk scene for a bit – I want to focus on library economies next. This one is based on two different ideas recommended for the village scene, which I decided to combine in their own photobash.
The first was to reconsider icehouses, not necessarily for storing ice for directly cooling food, but as part of a much larger temperature regulation system and meltwater reservoir.
They suggested creating buildings with flat roofs with hatches on top and earthen ramps up the sides, where snow could be hauled in from roads and walkways, pushed up the ramps, and down into the open hatches. They also suggested harvesting ice from a designated pond, which is why I added a pond to the small waterway in the village in my last photobash.
The cool idea (I thought) was that in the summer, the snow and ice can be used as centralized air or water chillers, part of systems for nearby apartment buildings, or, if the buildings are adjacent to barns (as in the village scene) then during deadly heat events the cooling effect could be used to protect the animals. The meltwater could also serve as an additional emergency water source for drought conditions if clean enough, and could even be misted around wilderness water sources to keep wild animals alive during heat disasters.
Otherwise, the meltwater would circulate into coolant loops then get discharged into algae farms or water treatment (because of road/path/roof/track matter scrapings.)
In my design, I decided to have these snow vaults dug as concrete pits in the ground, to make loading them easier. Roller doors and insulation, along with railings and gates, would hopefully make them fairly safe, while the roof would protect them from the sun and rainwater seeping in. This thing might make for snow removal easier in especially snowy years, as they’d have someplace nearby to put a lot of it. Hopefully when they’re filling the vault, an assistant is out keeping watch for pedestrians who might for some reason wander into the pit.
I’m not an engineer, and I know my limits in designing new structures. But I also know that in a lot of systems, cold is a resource, something you always have to create heat to produce. So a big reservoir of free cold has to be useful somehow. I also like the idea of turning a wintertime hassle into a resource, both for temperature regulation and for water supplies.
I decided to combine the snow vault idea with a possible use for some existing Internal Combustion Engine vehicles – conversion to run on woodgas. I think in rural areas, like this village, society will continue to need some independent vehicles. I think in this setting, that doesn’t mean everyone is driving around in personal automobiles, but that some are maintained for specific tasks, by hobbyists, and by farmers, forest managers, and others whose work takes them impractically far from public transit. I think woodgas is a good fit here. It emphasizes reuse of existing machinery instead of new manufacturing. It doesn’t require high-tech electronics like electric vehicles. And it’s less practical for the kind of quick trip to the store or daily commute which has shaped our current society. A woodgas vehicle takes awhile (ten to twenty minutes to start up), can’t easily be stored indoors, and because the fire needs to burn down, doesn’t make much sense for short trips. But in a solarpunk society, most folks shouldn’t need a car for that stuff – they’d be walking or taking public transit. So conversions like this would be used for special trips – hauling produce to town, supplies out to forest management camps, research sites, and other remote locations. And perhaps for road trips by campers and other people who might borrow one for an adventure. The wood can be sustainably sourced, using scraps from sawmills, harvested invasive trees, brush, and even dedicated coppiced plantations of especially fast growing trees like paulownia elongata. One of the byproducts of gassification is biochar, which can be tremendously useful in compost, and holds carbon for a comparatively long time. I also think its important to note that while this can be done well, when these vehicles were previously used in massive numbers (during WWII) they led to deforestation. They make sense in small doses, and with some careful management of their inputs.
Sorry if any details are unclear in the art, I’ve been looking at a lot of Christmas cards lately, and wanted to aim for that aesthetic with this one.
This image and all the other postcards are CC-BY, use them how you like.
Snow can definitely be useful in summer - but I would store it differently. I have observed that the local airport simply piles its snow up into a massive heap. This heap sometimes lasts until early June.
If I would need to store snow, I would likewise pile it, but would use two tricks: the ground under the heap would be thermally insulated, and once weather turns warm, the heap would be covered with a blanket of some kind. A hatch is just as good as a blanket, of course, but uses more material.
Actually, since storms have a tendency to blow away blankets, a depression / pond where to deposit the snow would probably be handy. Nothing too well engineered - just an insulated bottom and a location that keeps ground water elsewhere.
The wood-powered car is a nice idea.
As for whether electric cars need fancy electronics - that is a debatable topic. :) A brushed DC motor wears out fast, but definitely doesn't need fancy stuff. An inverter to produce 3-phase alternating current for a brushless motor can be rigged up with relays and reed switches, but those have a shorter lifetime than power transistors. A fixed-speed motor controller can likely be radically simpler than a variable speed controller. As for how simple a transistor-based motor controller can get... well, at least one microchip is advisable. But it doesn't do much - the calculation it performs is simple. I think that in a solarpunk society, someone would manufacture such a chip in their excessively well equipped barn. The chip would not be efficient, but would work.
Now, power transistors would better be efficient... so they cannot be too homebrew. I think a dedicated factory might be needed to make those. The other parts - resistors, capacitors, are a piece of cake.
TBH, when I mentioned electronics, I was mostly thinking of the battery and controls to eke out as much efficiency as possible. I know the battery is a pretty common complaint around electric vehicles (fancy materials to get the energy density it needs, environmentally-damaging mines, hard to recycle) and also that mitigations definitely exist, including repurposing tired batteries to other tasks, like stacking them up in houses for solar power storage. I agree on all the rest - I wrote a whole rant way back about streetcars and how effective they were, even using late 1800s electrical tech, motors, and metallurgy. I think they're a great option for electric transportation without many drawbacks when they're on the grid (where they can draw straight from the source, and where the power can be stored in everything from gravity batteries to simpler and easier-to-maintain chemical ones), and a great starting point for a rebuilding society.
I could definitely see snow storage methods varying widely, especially based on location, and the intended purpose.