About CEDO's Earthship

What is an Earthship?

Earthships use waste materials - old tires and aluminum cans - plus sand and cement to create low cost, energy efficient structures that are simple to build.

This type of construction was pioneered by architect Mike Reynolds from New Mexico.

How do you build an Earthship?

Volunteers construct the Visitor Center's tire walls.

The can dome.

The original completed Earth Ship.

Building an Earthship is labor intensive but relatively simple. Anyone can build an Earthship!

Construction begins with laying rows of tires. Because the tires are so wide, no foundation is required. Each tire is packed with nearly 300 pounds of sand. In total there are over 250 tires and approximately 75,000 pounds of sand in the walls of the CEDO Earthship. On top of the tire walls two "can walls" (aluminum cans placed in cement) were laid eight inches apart.

Other walls are basically a sandwich of two-inch styrofoam with aluminum can/cement walls on either side. When plastered these walls are nearly one foot thick and have tremendous insulating value.

The "can dome" is also made of uncrushed aluminum cans and cement. The cans reduce the amount of cement needed for the dome, and thereby the cost, and they also greatly reduce the weight of the dome.

The outer dome, two feet above the can dome, is a thin shell of concrete. The space between the two domes is filled with crushed, dried halophyte ("salt-loving") plant material, which can be irrigated with salt water, for insulation. The Mexican company GENESIS provided the plant material for the insulation of the dome as well as for the adobe which covers the interior wall of the tire room.

What are the benefits of building an Earthship?

This type of construction provides many benefits. Earthships are environmentally friendly, reusing trash that would otherwise be a source of contamination and pollution. Earthships are also very well insulated and use much less energy than conventional houses.

The CEDO Earthship is oriented towards the South-Southwest, enabling the winter sun to shine in and warm the interior, while keeping the front glass in the shade during the summer. The 4.5 foot skylight at the top of the dome is also used to regulate the temperature inside.

The building is buried in sand up to the level of the dome which provides tremendous insulation value along with the three-foot thick tire walls. The massive tire walls soak up heat during the day and re-radiate it at night, thereby keeping the Earthship heated. This insulation plus the passive solar design maintains a relatively constant temperature throughout the year without additional heating or cooling. This energy efficiency greatly reduces the costs of heating and cooling a home.

CEDO's Earthship is a relatively simple one but larger, more complex structures can easily be built with this tire/can technology. The modular nature of the design allows structures to be built as large, or as small, as one's imagination desires and time allows.

Our Earthship was built with volunteer labor and donated materials as a demonstration project for Puerto Peñasco. This and future CEDO Earthships will be used for exhibition, office, classroom and dormitory space. Work continues now on the interior of the second CEDO Earthship.