[Christ]

Neil - It's not a final plan, was just the first in a series of layouts that we thought of... the rooms will inevitably be smaller than that, but there has to be an "extra room", in case there comes an "extra child" to the family. Planning in advance, so I don't have to remodel later, basically.

I'm not entirely sure what the overall grade of the layout area is, but the whole area and part of the surrounding area where the actual foundation is being poured is going to be flattened and the area directly above and below that are going to be terra-formed (tiered structure with drainage into the creek).

There are a few trees in the way, unfortunately, which will need to be removed, but my father burns wood for heat anyway, and they'd have come down at some point regardless of the situation.

The actual land plot is within 100 feet of the dirt road that my dad lives on, and the land directly across the road from my "plot" is also mine to use. I intend to use solar-powered water pre-heaters (coils in a box, basically) for heat and during the summer, on a bypass loop to help generate electricity for the house. So far, I haven't a clue what fluid I'll be using in the pre-heater, but it has to be something that, if a leak/break occurs, won't harm anything around it, and won't cost me my first born to replace. That pretty much cancels ethylene glycol, for sure.

My father's property runs on a well fed by the creek that runs on the property, which means that I can either dig further into his well, dig my own well, (at over $5k), or accept the reality that it's all rain water to begin with, and start using the rain water and water collection from the creek.

Water from the creek, since it's cold all year 'round, will ultimately be what cools the house (when necessary) through the summer. The land is mostly shaded, so only horribly hot days will call for any kind of A/C, which will just be cold water running through a rather large radiator, with a fan blowing through it into the home's duct work.

So far, the floor and roof are both scheduled to be concrete... living roof, actually.

Looking at that floor plan, there is only one entranceway... technically, this won't pass code, b/c there needs to be an "emergency exit" or "secondary exit way"... that will be on the other side of the great room, and will exit in to the "yard" area. Proper orientation will place the great room's long wall facing south, so the entranceway will be to the east, facing the hill area, on the opposite side of the home from the road. (cuts down on dust)

The walls of the home will primarily not be exposed to sunlight during the day, due to the wooded land surrounding my plot, except during the winter, when the trees loose their leaves. The plot is between two large hills, so "daytime" and direct sunlight hours are cut slightly, but it shouldn't cause too many issues with anything.

The only risk factor for the home as far as natural disaster is freezing temperatures in the winter... and it's Northern PA... not Alaska. I'm trying to build a solar heating system large enough to support the house (which means the house WILL be smaller than the drawing), so that only supplemental heat will be necessary on the coldest days.

Part of the foundation plans were to pipe in Geothermal heating pipes from about 60 feet down into the concrete foundation slab, to help keep the concrete slab a stable temperature all year 'round... on top of that, I wanted to run the solar-heater's piping through the slab as well.

No considerations have been made for windows or door type yet. The interior wall height is 9 feet.

I hope I included everything. I'll have some pics of the plot tonite... hopefully they're not too bad, and can give you guys an idea of what I'm working with.