Cold Times — How to Prepare for the Mini Ice Age

by Dr. Anita Bailey

  My home is at about 36o north latitude, well within the cold zone but certainly not into the worst parts of it. We already have four very different seasons, with moderately cold winters and hot, humid summers. Spring and fall are generally mild and pleasant.

  It is likely that during the Cold Time, winters for us will get colder, wetter, snowier, and longer. Summers may become mild with some spiking hot or freezing periods. Spring and fall will probably be cool to frosty, with high flood risks, but otherwise okay. Our growing season will likely shorten from 6 months to 4, with the risk of the loss of warmth-loving crops in both late spring and early fall. It would be as if we moved 700 miles north today.

  Best Place Scenario

  The easiest and clearest way to envision the place you need to be living, in order to weather the Cold Times, is to describe it. Some elements may not be understandable until you’ve gone through the rest of the book and internalized the rationale – just recognize that there is a big picture that will make sense when we close in the final chapter.

  Land

  Avoid: anywhere below a dam, downwind of nuclear reactors and military facilities, known missile silos, regions with a history of rioting, major highways or rivers, population density, areas already known for extremely cold winters.

  Figure that you will need 5 acres for each adult you expect to be living with you. If you have an extended family of 20, that would be a minimum requirement for 100 acres. About half of the land, at least, should be crop, pasture, or hay land, with the rest in woods.

  You must have free, available year-round water sources, such as rivers, ponds, swamps, streams, or artesian wells. None of these should be major, named waterways (which will either be highly controlled or overrun). If your area is already prone to dry spells, make sure you can put water-holding tanks, cisterns, or new ponds into place to sustain you through the dry periods. Keep in mind that some currently dry areas won’t be in the coming years.

  The woods will provide heating fuel, building materials, some degree of protection from wind and snow, water-holding capacities, access to tree nuts or other wild forage, and an area that can be home to native animals for occasional harvest as a food source.

  Ideal home sites are situated below the tops of hills and above any possible risk of flooding, sheltered from prevailing wind, and facing into the south for winter sun (in the southern hemisphere, that would be north-facing). In addition, clear lines-of-sight surrounding the area will help with the defensive positions, which we’ll discuss in a later chapter. Trees and landscaping must be 20 to 40 feet from the house to reduce risk from fire and falling limbs. We are discussing a time when home insurance is just a memory, and the Fire Department is “you”.

  Minimize potential risks.

  Neighbors

  Unless we are surrounded by family, we have little control over who lives around us. We do have the capacity to know our neighbors, though, and be willing to recognize who might be an ally and who needs to be handled with kid gloves.

  Neighbors are the people who will need your help and will help you when you require some assistance. They can support defense of your area; become trading-partners so that chores and products can be exchanged; and, as time passes, neighbors will be the people who your clan suffers with, celebrates with, marries and has children with. It is to you and your group’s advantage to cultivate the good ones, and find a way to remove the trouble-makers.

  Buildings, Structures

  Today’s typical stick-built home is poorly constructed to withstand weather extremes. Mobile homes and RV trailers are worse. They are nothing but a light wood frame with a metal or fiber skin, and a set of fiber interior panels. Without exterior heat sources (electric, propane, or natural gas) and air conditioning, these are unlivable spaces even today and will be death traps when the Cold arrives.

  We cannot assume that general weather patterns will remain as they are today: regions that have never had a tornado, now report repeated incidents. Rain pours down like a river from the sky in other areas, creating intense pressure on buildings and causing roofs and ceilings to collapse. These changes are in addition to the effects caused by heavy snow loads and extreme spring water run off as the snow melts.

  The Swiss have thousands of years of experience living in a glaciated and frozen climate, and their architecture reflects that. The structures are squatty, and built to be able to carry heavy snow weights, generally utilizing enormous log-beams for structural elements. Many are constructed with heavy stonework around the base to act as a water repellant zone. A second story allowed access even during snow so deep that the ground-level was covered. The roof line extends away from the walls, so that the snow, icicles, and water runoff falls away from the walls and reduces water intrusion into the house. Windows are relatively small to facilitate heat retention. The walls are considerably thicker than conventional homes – greater volume in the wall means better insulation and heat retention. Finally, chimneys provide the ability to build fires and cook meals – some home’s masonry chimneys generate heat from the entire stone heater structure, making wood use more efficient.

  Looking at other cultures that have adapted well to extreme cold, provides good examples of how to survive in lean circumstances.

  The Vikings, professionals at living in severe cold, built “long houses” – low, long, narrow structures that were sturdy enough to hold up under snow loads, and shed the ice and snow readily.

  Most important for our perspective isn’t the sod-type roof, but the fact that this one appears to have been built into the hillside or soil-work was packed around the exterior. The surrounding soil helps retain heat. Notice the chimney has a propped up stone cover that will keep snow from entering the top. The front entrance leads to a covered “porch” or “mudroom” type arrangement, so that the actual entry door is both covered and out of the wind and weather. Tiny vents are visible to the top right end of the building, which would have let in a little light and fresh air.

  The downside of many of these structures is that wood is a major part of the interior, the walls, ceiling and sides – highly flammable. With open fires for heat and light, the risk of torching the place was always present. For our purposes, and long-term safety, stone or concrete makes a safer building material.

  Which brings us to the modern equivalent of the Icelandic Viking long house, the underground house. Notice the remarkable similarities to the previous image -- placement of the door, the covered chimney, the earthwork surrounding the walls and back – clearly demonstrating than the ancient design doesn’t require much in the way of “modern” improvements.

  The heat retention of this home would be excellent. A somewhat more-covered “porch” area could provide better weather resilience and would keep blowing snow and rain from entering each time the door was opened – and, of course, the large windows would generate some heat loss. But double-paned and insulated glass could compensate by providing better lighting than our forebears had. Heavy curtains could retain heat at night, too.

  This type of building is commonly called “earth sheltered”. There are multiple online sites and many books that have plans and guidelines galore, so there’s no lack of existing information that won’t need to be repeated here. Just think “mass”.

  The critical elements of earth sheltered design are keeping the walls protected from water infiltration by waterproofing and drainage lines, allowing light into the interior, and making sure there is adequate fresh air entering the structure – particularly if a fireplace or stove is used for heat and cooking. This could be an ideal location for a rocket-type mass heater, which is adequate for cooking and outstanding for heating an underground space.

  The ultimate earth-sheltered design is likely humankind’s oldest dwelling space: a cave. If you are fortunate enough to own land with a cave on it, do not overlook the possibilities of converting that into a livable space. Modification to prevent flooding and to assure ventilation might be significantly less expen
sive than retrofitting an existing dwelling, or building something new. Plus, caves tend to maintain steady temperatures year-around, a real benefit during cold spells.

  Caves, also, are naturally resistant to marauders, may have additional “rooms” so that there is some level of privacy, and can act as cool storage for food and other provisions or even a home for small livestock. Some caves may have free-moving water, seasonal streams, or other easy-water accesses. You may have to divert an in-cave stream during times of heavy rain or snow, a more costly and time-consuming project, but possibly worthwhile.

  Be sure there are at least 3 separate, disguised exits, in case the main entryway is blocked or attacked – even bunnies make extra exits from their burrows.

  Using Passive Heat

  In a cold time, any means to collect heat that requires little effort is a valuable tool as well as a time and human energy-saver. In the chapter on growing food in cool climates, we’ll see the benefits of heat-retaining walled gardens on extending the growing season, but here we are looking at an example of the “Trombe Wall”.

  This is merely a masonry or other heat-retaining mass (water and cob will work, too) that is situated to receive full sun during the winter day, but with an overhanging roof that limits summer time sun. Set behind heavy glass windows situated on the right in this image, the low winter sun shines on the wall all day, and utilizes floor and ceiling vents in the wall to move air into the interior of the home. At night the vents are closed, and the heat built up during the day stays inside the house.

  The glassed area also receives reflected heat from the Trombe wall after the sun has gone down. Imagine, too, that the glassed area has a dark, heat-retaining floor of dark concrete, stone, or tile, and that low fast-growing cool tolerant plants (kale, lettuce, bok choi, etc.) are situated in planters to receive mid-day sun. Now, place heavy curtains that can be drawn over the windows at night to keep heat inside that glassed area, and you have both a means to “passively” warm your home and grow a small winter greens garden indoors. This is the idea behind “earthship” homes.

  The “mass” of the Trombe wall, plus the heating rays of the sun, combine to provide a level of comfort within any dwelling. However, even the best Trombe wall is limited. When the sun is obscured by clouds or during snow storms, the wall neither retains nor radiates heat.

  When you are thinking about being prepared for intense cold, consider how you can utilize natural means to increase, retain, and magnify the heat that already exists. More in later chapters. Including efficient wood-burning stoves that do not require fans or other technological additions is part of that picture. Siting a dwelling so that it is sheltered from the fiercest seasonal storms, and so that summer breezes blow through, or so that unwanted heat rises outside easily, are part of that consideration as well.

  Today’s systems for heating and cooling have all but erased the once-intimate structural awareness of natural placement for buildings. Most new construction, especially of office towers and academic settings, are created as architectural art, fully dependent on air conditioning (windows don’t open), continuous grid power, and pressure systems that lift columns of water to upper stories. When the Cold Times fully arrive, when the economy makes electricity too expensive to maintain, when all the human constructs we have built our society around no longer function at adequate capacity, then the reliance on the old ways – gravity, air flow, mass – will return again.

  Retrofitting

  It is probable that many readers of this book already have a city, suburban, or residential home and would prefer to remain there. I caution you to think carefully about where you will be when the Cold is upon us. No suburban residence will survive social calamity, fires that rage through when firemen are busy protecting their own, and the general failure of civility that lays ahead. There is no benefit to beating around the bush and softening that reality.

  Access to five acres per adult means a rural setting but proximity to a city can be part of that picture. It just shouldn’t be easy to get to or find your home, so do not be on a major highway. “Three turns” from the main road are your minimum goal, according to survival blogger James Wesley Rawles: a side road off a side road, off a side road. The less “curb appeal”, the better!

  Even given that, it is extremely unlikely that you already have a Cold Times-ready home. Therefore, retrofitting is probably going to be a part of your near-term plans. Retrofitting is making the changes in a residence to conform to a new standard. The new standard your home needs to conform to is: intense snowload, extreme cold, no electricity, no gas or propane, no water mains, no police or fire department, sited well above flood plains, and probable presence of dependent visitors/family.

  If you prepare for the worst case, even if power and society remains intact, you will be ready for any scenario and doubly ready for any commonplace downturn, illness, or job loss. That’s a win-win. This chapter will consider the “intense snowload and extreme cold” retrofit, and the rest will be dealt with in the remainder of the book.

  Snowload

  Today, a light fluffy snow weighs about 7 pounds per cubic foot. A heavy, compacted snow can weigh 20 pounds per cubic foot. So, if a pleasant light snowfall puts a mere 12 inches of snow on 1000 square feet of your small house’s roof, that’s 7000 pounds, close to 4 tons, additional weight over your head. Two feet of snow puts 14,000 pounds on your roof, walls, and foundation – 7 tons.

  Now, imagine 12 inches of heavy dense snow, 20 pounds per cubic foot. That’s 20,000 pounds, bearing down on your 2x4 wall studs, and pressing your roof’s beams into those walls. Suppose you have 24” of heavy snow built up over several days to 40,000 pounds. That is 20 tons, sitting on your roof, more than 40 pounds on each square foot of roof.

  In Minnesota, where heavy snowfall is the routine during winter, the minimum legal requirement is that a roof support 35 pounds per square foot. Compare that number with, say, 3 feet of heavy snow falling. Parts of Italy received over 5 feet of snow in one storm in early 2017; parts of China received 15 feet! Hundreds of buildings collapsed under snow in Oregon, Colorado, and Washington during the 2016-2017 winter. Fifteen feet of light snow would weigh over 100 pounds per square foot; heavy snow would be over 300 pounds per square foot. Even in Minnesota, that amount of snow would crush houses.

  In 2016, the rule of thumb for heavy snow loads, was to climb on up there and shovel the snow off your roof. Sounds like a lot of fun, during a blizzard. Naturally, of course, that will pile snow around your home’s walls as you dump it off the roof. Will your walls stand up well to tons of pressure against them? How will your walls tolerate all that water melting out of the snow beside them?

  Too Much Roof Snow

  One of the simplest ways to check if your roof is undergoing stress, is to go outside and visually examine it under snow weight. If any sags are visible, you have a problem. Next, visit the attic and the basement. Look for sagging, bowing, or dripping, especially if pipes are bent or bowed. Listen for pops or cracking sounds.

  Check that all doors and windows open as easily as usual. Any sticking, especially if doors or windows are jammed shut, means your house has actually shifted under the weight of the snow already. Stuck doors and windows combined with popping and cracking sounds means: get out right now. Do not go back inside until the snow is gone, and a structural engineer has said it’s safe. If structural engineers are absent, then you’re on your own and need to reinforce what you have OR build something new. Don’t use it until it has been made safe, or you risk having yourself and family crushed to death.

  A Stronger Roof

  One relatively simple but not necessarily inexpensive method to strengthen the structure over your head, is to build a second roof above your existing home. If you live in a location that has stringent codes, you will probably find it nearly impossible to get a building permit for something this uncommon. However, if you are in a rural area, or society has devolved so far that regulations no longer are enforced,
this is a do-it-yourself (DIY) project that can preserve your residence and improve your comfort in the time to come.

  A standard roof supports weight by a combination of structural elements. Rafters are the beams that extend from the peak of the roof to the top of the wall at the top plate. At the peak, rafters from both sides of the sloping roof join to a central “ridge beam”.

  Each rafter is joined to its twin on the opposite slope of the roof by a collar tie, placed about a third of the way up the rafter length. At the level of the top plate, each rafter is met by a ceiling joist that crosses to the opposite twin rafter. This is the absolute minimum structural layout in standard construction. More solidly constructed roofs are also possible, but require stronger wall construction to support the weight.

  The strength of the structure arises from the rafter “base” [B] or width, and from the rafter “height” [H], the depth. So a rafter beam that is, say, 2” wide and is 6” in depth, has a base of 2” and height of 6”. The length of the rafter can vary – 10, 12, 14, 16 feet are not uncommon.

  There’s lots of ways to build a roof, so I’m including a few ideas here. Use what you have or what you can improvise, and aim toward strength and stability.