( ENERGY ) Wood Stoves: How to Make and Use 1 •• Them, Ole Wik, 1977, $5.95 from: Alaska Northwest Publishing Co. Graphically illustrating the effect of necessity upon invention, Ole recounts his own and others' experience in making wood stoves from discarded scrap. Techniques of using a limited number of primitive hand tools to produce practical woodburners are well explained. This book is an excellent guide for one who, by choice or circumstance, wants to build his own stove. Ole injects his personality into his writing so that the book is easy and interesting to read. -Bill Day Dear Rain, We've·got a specific problem (challenge, opportunity) here, and we need h,elp. There's a fellow setting up an auto repair shop, a valued service in this remote area, back in our community where there are no electric .lines so far. He wants (and we want) the shop to be powered by an alternative source of electricity rather than see it tied into ' the nuclear grid. But we don't know the best way to do it, or if it's really even feasible. If we could do it successfully, it'd be a strong political . statement and a model for other similar communities. We hear that wind, sola,r or steam power require great expense, particularly for storag~ batteries. What we're after, though, is a non-fossil, renewable, non- or minimal-pollution energy source. We have acce~s to some funding, but also understand that there's a program of small grants available for work in this are.a. Maybe you know more about that. Is it possible to pow.er a small shop via an alternative source of electricity without spending thousands an'd thousands of dollars? We're really at an important ·crossroads for our small community, and whatever help you can offer will be truly appreciated. Many thanks, Jerry Friedberg Route 2, Box 96C Leslie, AK 72645 JerryRather than producing all that highquality and, as you .mention, expensive • electricity to do mechanical work, a poor matching of energy-quality to actual end-use energy needs, as .Amory Lovins and Howard Odum ~ave taught us, why not use a wind-mechanicalhydraulic tool or -compressed air tool system, converting only a very small part of the mechanical energy to electricity for a few fluorescent shop lights? Ifyou don't have wind but do have a year-round streamfiow, a small hydroelectric set-up using a pelton wheel (impulse turbine) would be still cheaper. Check that out with Bill Delp, Independent Power Developers, Noxon, MT 59853, and see the Nov. '77 ASE as well, Any ofyou readers who do answer , Jerry, please send a copy of your suggestions to RAIN. It'll help us answer similar queries. Thanks very much. - L] December 1977 RAIN Page 3 Help! Nuclear and Renewable Energy info needed by: Centro d'Informazion Kristina Anderson . Via Mattioli, 17 06100 Perugia Italy A group of Italian students working on nuclear energy issues and the possibilities offered by alternative energy sources has just opened this information center and would like to receive info on these topics fr.om the U.S. and elsewhere. They offer to pay for xeroxing, postage and other costs incurred 'in getting info to them. Won't you help? Can you put them on your mailing list? • RAIN has sent them all the OAT sourcelists. Thanks very much. ~LJ RAIN's office is at 2270 N.W. Irving, Portland, OR 97210. Ph: (503) 227-5110. I RAIN STAFF: ' Tom Bender Lane deMoll Marcia Johnson Lee Johnson I Typesetting: Irish Setter Printing: Times Litho Joan Meitl AND NOW THIS IS THE BEST SOLAR HOME BOOK! ... FOR A WHILE ANYWAY. AND NEW RAYS OF HOPE For a bit there Bruce Anderson's and Donald Watson's books . were irreplaceable. But Alex Wa.de's new $8.95 Rodale book has now eclipsed them both and is the only solar home publication I will be recommending, especially to those ownerbuilders with limited funds who trust me to tell them the "one best source." We've really got one now! 30 Energy-Efficient Houses f OU Can Build is so excellent that follow-on revisions and copy-cat authors will have to really know their stuff in hands-on construction skills, costcutting techniques, inexpensive and practical passive solar design, and energy-saving restoration and remodeling to produce-a better compendium of well-detailed principles and basic house plans. Yes, house plans, friends. And if you use only one of Alex's hints, you'll pay back this book's cost many times over. . A perfect Christmas gift too ... it's beautiful enough for dreaming over, full of photos with people in them, but why not get it dirty with thumbprints as you build your own. Almost forgot ... Rodale Press, 33 E. Minor, Emmaus,,PA 18049. -LJ If y_ou were to tell me that you already had read Amory Lovin 's book Soft Energy Paths (Ballinger) and wanted to get the next two best publications mentioned in this issue, I'd suggest Alex Wade's 30 Energy-Efficient Homes You Can Build, if you wanted to actually build/remodel your home, and Deni~ Hayes' new book, Rays of Hope: Th~ Transition-to a PostPetroleum World, $9.95 from W.W. Norton & Co., 500-5th Ave., New York, NY 10036, if you liked Soft Paths. I like to·think of Denis's book as complementary to Amory's, with Rays providing a more tech_nical but highly readable state-of-the-art survey of what is now possible with solar-based energy sources, what a solar society might mean and how the end of nuclear pqwer, the use of conservation and the transition to solar energy·can lead to a better future life for us all. It ranks up there with Wilson Clark's pathfinding encyclopedia, Energy for Survival (Doubleday), and updates it very well. Rays_ is an excellent perspective on our situation and what we can do about it. Don't miss reading it. - LJ
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