I was pleased to see lots of discussion of the zombie apocalypse on twitter the other day, all sparked by this blog from the US Centre for Disease Control http://blogs.cdc.gov/publichealthmatters/2011/05/preparedness-101-zombie-apocalypse/ So I was thinking about how the zombie apocalypse might affect my business of eco retrofitting, pretty badly I think and I am not sure a bicycle is the right mode of transport to escape from zombies. However I did realise that many of the measures you take to improve the environmental performance of your house would also help you come the zompocalypse.
Draught proofing and insulation are essential to cut noise that would reveal your presence to any lurking zombies and also help reduce the chances of any airborne infections. Traditional methods of keeping your house warm, heavy curtains, shutters etc will stop any tell tale flickers of light from your zombie hideaway.
Evading zombies is dirty work so coming home to solar thermal water heating means you can wash the smell of fear right off, providing you can get a safe source of water that is. Perhaps a pond on your green roof could help with this? Of course a green roof could also provide some much needed fresh veg to supplement your diet of looted cans and dried food.
Assuming the zombies have knocked out the sewer and drainage facilities things will be getting pretty smelly so a SUDS system with plenty of reed beds will be an excellent way of processing your waste while reducing possible flooding issues in your neighbourhood.
I also guess that the zombies will have taken out the power network so you will need some way to power your SOS signals for help. Photovoltaics on the roof should solve this as well as providing some power for low energy lighting to illuminate your weapon stripping.
Not sure what happens in the winter, it always seems to be hot in zombie films but I am guessing that even if the zombies do die out power and fuel will still be scarce so ground source heat pumps would be a good way of heating your hideout. If you meet with others and develop a compound you can start to add other measures: a combined heat and power plant would maximise what fuel you have and perhaps a wind turbine wouldn’t attract interest from the zombie hordes.
In summary therefore, going green will help when the zombies come! Next up ‘The rise of the machines, will biodiversity help us fight back?’
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