One of the things that happens when you decide to build a sustainable house is that you have to recognise that it's not going to be a huge house. Our design is marginally over the Australian average size of 232m2 at around 240m2, which is not unreasonable considering that average-sized house is on a block maybe 500m2, while we are on 20,500m2.
It was going to be smaller at one point, and then much larger, and now we're at a size we are comfortable with for what we are going to be using it for.
But there's no escaping we have lots of stuff which we currently jam into spare bedrooms, garages and the like, none of which our house will have. So, you look at what people do on large rural lots and we decided to get a lot of cheap floor space with a shed.
The main shed is 9x11m, designed to fit our caravan inside for temporary occupancy:
This is what we are currently racing to finish so we can move on to the site and watch the house build, plus stop wasting more money on rent. Once the house is complete, we'll sell the caravan (you're not allowed to have a second dwelling on your land so fitting out bedrooms and the like would have been a waste). It will have a bathroom and a laundry, while the caravan contains a kitchen and our beds. We can also heat and cool the caravan efficiently - something almost impossible in a large uninsulated metal shed.
It will be basic but more comfortable by far than either the caravan or shed alone would be, plus the bathroom and of course the shed itself will serve as future useful space for putting our stuff, which was the original problem.
The other problem is that of solar power. Neither this big shed nor our house are ideally designed or located to fit solar panels. There is some conflicting information, but the general recommendation is that for grid-connected solar power you want the panels and inverted located as close as possible to the meter. In our case, the panels on the house would be about 100m from the meter, and the shed around 200m. The shed is also not aligned north for maximum solar gain, and the roof isn't ideal.
So we are building a second smaller shed, 5m x 6m, and calling it a stables. It will have a skillion (one sloping pane) roof, angled directly to true north for maximum solar gathering, and is located as close as possible to the meter - around 40m. Any closer and an existing well established tree would have overshadowed it. The stables function is for future livestock housing - whatever cute furry thing Liz and/or the kids claim follow them home in the future :)
Today is the first day this week I have seen the sun, so with luck the slabs go in on Monday, the shed kit is built shortly thereafter, and the solar panels get installed just before the June 30th deadline before they become much more expensive due to government rebate changes.
Then mid-July is the current target to be moved up to the land permanently, to watch, assist and be intimately involved in our sustainable house build. The sheds themselves aren't overly sustainable, but they are built minimally to purpose, and will last a long time.