Jordan Valley Permaculture Project

Jordan Valley Permaculture Project

http://permaculture.org.au/project_profiles/middle_east/jordan_valley_permaculture_project.htm

Location: The Dead Sea Valley in Jordan
Start Date: March, 2008
Expected Completion Date: March, 2011

Project Concept

To establish a model project of sustainable arid land development, demonstrating that all the basic needs for a healthy, meaningful, peaceful lifestyle can be affordable, understood and achieved by poor local people. The project site is typical marginal arid land settled by poor people of the area. It will feature demonstrations of energy efficient appropriate housing with natural cooling systems and a plant nursery attachment, solar electricity, solar hot water, biological waste water treatment recycling, dry compost toilet, rain water harvesting earthworks, diverse inter-active plant animal and tree systems for local food production and processing. The demonstration house will function as a classroom, administration office for the project and the local community permaculture group. Once established the project will serve as a model that can be replicated throughout Jordan and other counties in the region.

Detailed Project Description

The Permaculture Research Institute has already purchased the land using a donation fund, the site is in the Jordan Valley also known as The Dead Sea Valley on the edge of and between the two villages of Al Jawfa and Al Jawasreh with the intention of setting up a demonstration site and education centre of an appropriate size, cost and style that would be achievable and acceptable for the local people. Geoff Lawton (Dir, PRI) has been working in the area since 1999 and designed and directed a 3 year project funded by JICCA. A short video of this project can be seen online click here, and the pictures below show the dramatic before-and-after results of this work.

Before and after photos of previous Jordan project

Geoff Lawton has developed many working relationships with people of this area and region and understand what it is that they need and require to improve their lives. They will benefit greatly from understanding the components and design systems that can create a sustainable community, meaningful life and peaceful existence.

Geoff Lawton has been working with the Permaculture Research Institute since 1998 establishing projects, teaching and designing sustainable systems in more 25 different countries worldwide. The house would be constructed in a style that is locally accepted and used, but orientated to be most efficient from a passive solar aspect for the local climate, with a concrete floor, support pillars and a concrete roof these materials are locally used and trusted as a standard of strength but the in-fill walls instead of being constructed of concrete blocks will be straw bale with an in fill straw bale roof and a second concrete slab on top of the roof straw bale in fill. This will mean the basic appearance of the house will look very similar to the conventional houses of the poor people in the area and the region but the insulation factor will be extremely high creating a very comfortable living environment and a very low energy use house. The design of window sizes and placement will be very specific as to maximise the efficiency and attachments to the house such as shade trellis and plant nursery incorporating and outdoor summer kitchen will also increase the energy efficiency and climate control. For more details click here.

The electricity for the house and complete project will be solar and will charge a 24 volt battery bank with a charge controller and an inverter so that the house will run on standard power voltage and all the normal standard appliances except the most energy efficient variations locally available will be purchased.

The toilet system will be a dry compost toilet of the faralone design which is a simple design that works very well and can be easily constructed from a plan.

The grey water from the house will be cleaned using a small gravel reed bed system that will allow the water to be re-cycled onto the fruit trees in the garden. The water requirements for the site will be supplied by a well bore that will be drilled and pumped during day light hours using a solar pump to a header tank at the top of the site and all water will be gravity fed throughout the site.

The site will be designed on contour with the main features being stone walled earth backed swales and small gabions that will trap store and soak all seasonal rainfall into the subsoil of the site and greatly increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the drip irrigation system. This system will begin the process of reducing evaporation allowing the growth of nitrogen fixing very hardy desert pioneer trees that will shade the area, reduce evaporation from wind and allow the establishment of a mixed food garden and small mixed orchard. These trees once mature can be regularly pollarded to produce surplus leaf material that can be used as garden mulch and animal forage and, the surplus small branches can be used as a cooking fuel.

Small domestic animal systems will be places around the site to take best advantage of their nutrient flows of manures. A pigeon loft built over the vegetable garden will both fertilise and help with shade. Rabbits will be housed in position so that their droppings directly feed compost worm farms that will be creating organic fertilizer. Chickens will be in a deep litter mulch yard system so that they process the mulch into high grade compostable material, chickens will also be housed in small mobile pens that will be used to tractor across the garden to prepare areas for planting. A duck pen will be built at the top of the site with a small pond that will have the facility to be drained into the gravity irrigation system as a fertigation element. A small aquaponics system will be established under shade in the plant nursery, this will be run on solar electricity and will produce both fish and leafy vegetable and herbs, for details click here.

Compost will be produced to increase soil fertility and extended using a micro compost tea brewing system, this will also be run on solar electricity for details click here.

A small digital microscope will be set up to show and explain the effects of increasing beneficial soil life on the fertility of the soil and the health and quality of the crops produced for details click here.

The house will be set up to cater for education courses on all the associated systems involved in how the site works, operates and can be replicated. The lounge room of will function as a classroom and will be equipped with chairs, desks, a laptop computer, digital projector, white board, information posters, pamphlets, plans, maps, digital microscope and small laboratory work bench. One of the bedrooms will function as the administration office staffed by a local administrator with telephone, laptop computer, internet connection, digital camera, photo copier, office desks and chairs. Two bedrooms will set up to be used for the accommodation of male students attending courses and internship programs female students will be accommodated with local families within the two adjoining villages, this is culturally acceptable. The kitchen will be equipped as a normal house kitchen and will cater for students and visitors and there will be an additional outdoor summer kitchen in the shade side of the house in the cool of the attached plant nursery this will also include a traditional wood fired bread oven. Examples of efficient solar drying of surplus food and natural methods of food preservation will be set up to extend the life of garden products and value-add.

A small separate bedroom will be built for a full time local guardian, maintenance man employed by the project.

The site will be operated by the local non-profit community permaculture society group which has already been established and will run educational courses and internships with all food produced on the site consumed on the site and all income from the education programs going back into staffing, maintaining and encouraging the duplication of the project in other areas. The main aim and major difference between this project and other similar projects are that within three years it will not only be sustainable on the ground in living and built infrastructure but also it will be have its own economic sustainability with on-going income from running education courses. This will be a truly sustainable aid project that can be replicated as a model worldwide.

The installation and establishment of the project will be fully documented with reports, digital photo journal and an ongoing web page journal with photos.

Project Duration and Schedule

Start date: March 2008
End date: September 2008
Phase details: Completion of all built infrastructure, house, guardians dwelling, fence, garden hardware, dry compost toilet, gravel reed bed, water tanks, irrigation, nursery and animal housing.

Start date: September 2008
End date: March 2009
Phase details: Installation of the solar electricity system, completion of all the planting and establishment of the animal systems, final finish of the house interior and furnishing, bedrooms, installation of the classroom, kitchens and office.

Start date: March 2009
End date: March 2010
Phase details: Establishment of the of the first year of education programs using residential staff from the permaculture research institute as mentors for local trainers to create the maintenance schedules of the living systems, built infrastructure, administration and education systems.

Start date: March 2010
End date: March 2011
Phase details: The establishment of the second year of education programs with a completely locally run operation with only checking and assessment by e-mail and skype connections with only limited visits from permaculture research institute staff help make any fine tuning that may be needed. Establishment of an extension program to other areas in Jordan where there is interest in replicating the system.

Start date: March 2011
End date: March 2011
Phase details: Hand over and the establishment of a permanent relationship with permanent web site links and promotion.