Solar Power that everyone is familiar with

Sunlight has been striking our planet with a spectrum of light for a very long time. We all have had the pleasure of eating food, the first and foremost solar power we have benefited from. Farmers across the world use it everyday.

So today I built another raised bed garden to harvest more home-grown organic food. Not only was it easy to build, but I know what will be going into my food and my body when I eat it.

I made mine out of cedar, 1x2s, 2x8s, 4x4, 4 copper caps, some screws. Buying the material took longer than constructing it.

Corners:

The corner consists of 1x2s screwed into the 4x4 corner with the 1x8s inserted into the slot created. I anchor the 1x8 into the 1x2 from the inside with another screw.

Sides:

The next board just slides on top of the first, there's no magic or perfect dimensions as it can vary, but a manageable size for leaning over to plant and harvest is about 3 to 4 feet in width and 8 feet long. This keeps the cutting down to a minimum.

Finished box:

Filling the box with some left over tomato stems from last fall, other compost in the bottom and miscellaneous dirt from a landscaping project, some peat moss. This box needs a little less than two cubic yards for fill.

A shot of all three of our boxes:

The one in the middle has a 1 x 2 trellis to hold the tomatos up, which was an addition the second year as my tomato plants were getting 7 feet tall. We use harvested rainwater to water the beds, compost for fertilizer and a little bit of time and get a lot of vegetables. I like the raised bed part because it keeps the critters out, and is a lot easier to work in.

Solar has never tasted so good!
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Here's a link to our sustainability page, under growing food you can see the tomato plants are taller than I am.
http://www.powerfullygreen.com/our-sustainability

Living With Solar Blog

Why this blog? It's simple. The more I understand the who, what, when, where and why about solar energy, the more I want to share the information so that everyone can make an informed choice on whether it is right for them.

The first and most important thing I have learned about solar is that there is always more to learn. Making adjustments in the way I use energy, and finding good ways to measure my use and understand that information allows me to make an "informed choice."

Much like driving our Prius with the on-board monitor which gives me instant feedback on what my driving is doing to my gas mileage, monitoring my energy use at home goes a long way to understanding what I am doing and what those costs are in dollars, in time, and to the environment.

I am a solar installer, and more importantly a solar homeowner. My business is Powerfully Green located in Champlin, MN a suburb of Minneapolis - St Paul, MN. I firmly believe in living with the technology I install on my customer's homes and businesses. This blog is to inform and increase understanding of our choices in energy use and energy production. Thanks for reading.
[dan]