Time for humanity to move underground?

All this talk of peak oil and its high prices and the negative effects on human economics makes me wonder if a solution is easy and right under our very noses?

How about humans going underground? It is easier to heat and cool living spaces? Saving a lot of fuel. We can better weather global warming than we can currently. If certain disasters come then maybe we can better withstand them too.

Crazy idea? would you live underground like in those secret military bases?

But, would you live without sun light? I mean, not just for general purposes like extract energy from it or help dry your clothes.

To be honest, I guess without sun light I would get depressed and sick really quick, specially here in South America.
I always wondered why my dog was always seeking for sunlight spots around the house, few weeks ago I discovered why.

Going underground would "save" the earth, or at least help. But it would kill us all.

Using Fiber optics and light storage mediums can allow you to pipe sunlight underground. Not only would this offset health impacts, but it could be used for growing crops underground and providing cheap illumination.

Also, just because you have built your home underground doesn't mean you can't go to the surface.

Underground doesn't need the mean deep underground either.
Check this out:

UnderGroundHomes.com
Kinda Shire-like, eh?

More information: Click here

Do you honestly beleive you could live without seeing the sky, the stars and feeling the wind / the sun.... no way !! Its part of our very being. We would just become depressed and useless.

During my time in the forces, at one stage for two and a half years i lived in a building with no windows or natural light. We went out on patrols so we did get to see daylight but we spent an awful lot of time inside.

A very weird way to live i can tell you. Can't be good for you if done for too long?

CX.

Coober-Pedy Aus. Opal mines... lots of underground homes and churches etc. Since about the 1920's perhaps earlier. Might be a model to look at. Haven't done any real research on it but I'm sure some Aussie's on ATS could illuminate the issue. Having been down a couple of deep mines (INCO, Sudbury CA) I can assure you it gets pretty freakin' hot and cooling is a problem at times... it is not a "dry" heat.

Interesting concept thanx for posting,

Victor K.

41'

thats the general theme for the next home i build, if i decide to build one

along with energy efficiency, & designed to use low environmental impact
materials & technologies.

i suppose that down in Antartica, the people there don't get hours of sunshine on their skin like the average person does either...and they're no worse off for it.

i also recall that the early christian cult (before it grew into a religion) lived in
underground cities in the central Turkey area called Cappadocia.

there's also the Morlocks, the underground race, of 'The Time Machine' story,
but they got sorta mutated, and became sensitive/allergic to sunshine...

but, i think that having a dwelling, dug into a side of a mountain, where you might spend 10 hrs a day, eating & sleeping in....shouldn't have a great detrimental effect on a families health !
unless you have toxic gasses leaking into your underground dwelling, or were unfortunate to be right on top of a pocket of Radon which is radioactive.

maybe people with that kind of civic & environmental initiative should get all types of tax credits and exemptions to assessment rates on the homes they build/create/fashion/

Aren't there already people living underground? Like Shamballa?

I read somewhere that we would stop producing meletonin if we didn't have sunlight and also that women become sterile.

High oil prices. How much do you think it would cost to relocate the workings of the human race underground. I don't think it would be worth it.

I work in a place that makes electrical boxes that hook up to poles and go underground. We make so many sometimes I joke that someone is making an underground city

could cope under ground as necessary.
But Why????
Right now I am inside but can hear the rain outside, I could go out side if i wanted to.
Freedom is it to me.

Under water is more likley.

You can covernt water to O2, ready food source, you can still have night and day supplied by the sun, you can still get some sun light since the oceans would filter the bad rays at depth. You could still fly and travel underwater even when the sun gets closer.

Under water is where the last men on earth will survive till she is too crispy to live on.

Underground construction is much more expensive then house building. Too expensive.

Originally posted by denythestatusquo
Crazy idea? would you live underground like in those secret military bases?

Foundation already dug. Network of friends and family across the states, the same or better.

The mammals that lived through the last extinction event did so as well.

The cheap answer is in homemade geodesic scaffolding and rubble concrete, or local rock if available. A crew of 6 men can have 250 sqft under a rubble concrete dome in less than a week with hot mortar and machinery to dig. It goes up just like an igloo. Put an ad in your local paper for "free rubble concrete drop off" if you have no rock... you'll have 4 - 30 yard containers by the end of the month. In the end, no cost beyond the labor and the borrowed back hoe. Salvaged petro station tanks are also used by some... though I'm not that desperate. Cadre Geo offers trial design software for basic geodesics. Keep the rock shell at least 10-15% as thick as the diameter of the dome it covers; 50 - 75 cm thick for 5 meter diameter dome... thicker at the base like any rock wall.

you can make man made caverns profitable until needed as rental space to a vineyard, cheese maker, tourist, etc.

3 foot of earth on top is magic. Radiation proof blanket and its always 58 F. It only takes a little fire to maintain temperature. Plus the extra dirt over arched shapes makes the shell stronger.

As for the belief that you would become depressed without the light of day... I choose to bury myself alive, so that my children may live to see the light of day. Such belief brings its own light. Besides... until the day that SHTF... I'll have south facing portholes and a door to the outside world.

Aside from my PC, which I use to gather resources and supplies, my lifestyle is already essentially off grid and in a tent. Before long I'll be retreating to my cave. I won't be bringing an internet connection along with me... so soon enough it will be goodbye to ATS. I'll miss you guys.

My worldview does not hold much promise for surface dwellers.

There is no cost when there is willpower.

Hope to see you on the other side.

I am,

Sri Oracle