Ecovillages: A New Form of Community Living

You may be wondering, what is an ecovillage? You can pretty much answer this question my looking at its name. Simply put, it is a community made up of people who care about the environment and living in an ecologically sustainable way.  In comparison to many forms of communal living, this idea of an ecovillage is new, beginning in the 1960’s-70’s. These communities can be found all over the world, ranging anywhere in size from 20 people to 2,000. People strive to have the smallest negative impact on the world around them as they can. Though this doesn't come without consequences to other aspects of society. Living in an eco village means you are environmentally aware, community oriented, and can live in a self sufficient and sustainable way.

Ecovillages are community centered places where people work together to achieve a certain way of living. I want to focus my attention on modern ecovillages, as they are becoming more and more popular in U.S. cities. There are a few different configurations of ecovillages nowadays. Some people live in communal houses with other people, and share a common rooms and spaces. Another style of village contains many houses each owned by different people and families. They live in these homes and share the land surrounding them with the other families. Because of the central focus of living in an environmentally friendly way, most, if not all of the homes in these communities are “green houses.” This means they use little to no power from the government or other outside sources. They produce their own energy usually through the use of solar panels. Another important resource is water. Many homes store rainwater in underground storage tanks to use in the summer for watering gardens in the dry months. This brings us to the next important aspect of an ecovillage; being self sufficient. Along with the green houses that are common in the villages, the people who inhabit them are good at reducing their carbon footprint in other ways. A big part of living in an ecovillage is producing almost all of your own food, and producing little to no waste. This means that ecovillages have a large amount of space dedicated to gardening or some type of farming. Everyone in the community has some part in feeding and taking care of the others. In this way, the communities are very social and tightly knit. People have to help each other in order to help themselves, whether this is in farming food, harnessing energy, composting everything, or decreasing their consumerism from the outside world. Everyone must work together to maintain this off the grid living situation. Some ecovillages even include cooperative homeschooling for the children from the community.

One example of an ecovillage I discovered while researching online is Twin Oaks Community, located in Central Virginia. Their unique take on communal living includes 100 people and has been around for 50 years! With people of a wide range of ethnicities and religion, this group is very diverse. They use unusual habits such as income sharing and car sharing, as well as running their own business. They practice non violence, cooperation, and sustainability. The members evenly disperse the work so everyone has a different job everyday. There are no leaders, so everything is decided democratically.

Personally, I think I would much rather live on a communal property with my own home and some shared responsibility, but not basing all my life choices on the group. To me, living in an ecovillage as involved as this one doesn't seem like a good time, though many people swear by it. Things aren't all peachy and great all the time when it comes to ecovillages in the United States. To live in a lot of ecovillages these days, you have to first, afford to build a new house. And this house must be environmentally friendly which can add to the building costs. Though the expense of building these green houses will probably be repaid in a short time (in terms of not paying for power or food) you still must have the money for this endeavor. This quickly narrows down the socio-economic diversity of people in the village. A final drawback of these communities is that in cities, there is usually a lack of space to build villages, so cheaper houses are bought and torn down to build new ones. In the long run, this drives out people who can't afford expensive houses, and bumps up the taxes in that area. This leads to gentrification of many poorer neighborhoods.

Overall, it is up to you to decide how you feel about ecovillages. I believe there are many benefits to living in a community of like minded people and working together. As well as living in a way that doesn't harm the environment around you. But this lifestyle doesn't come without consequences.