The large upstairs living/dining room boasts bright windows from eye periphery on the left to eye periphery on the right. The view here doesn't do it justice as one looks across the dining room built-in counter. The domed room is about 30 feet across.
These pictures were taken at night, as you can see, without the aid of professional photography equipment. To the human eye the home is bright and open with lots of light.
To the rear of the living/dining room a spacious gazebo-like kitchen is open and airy. In the winter one can relax in the living room and feel the radiant heat coming down from the top of the dome as heat pours into the home from the warm (specially insulated) heat storing earth around the home. It's like sitting in the sun shine. Walking into the kitchen, with its false ceiling, feels like stepping into the shade. In fact it is.
Still, the most advanced book available on the subject is Passive Annual Heat Storage, Improving the Design of Earth Shelters. This 1983 text is still quite up to date as it teaches the basic methods of understanding natural heat flow methods that never change. Other supplementary materials, home plans and instruction videos are available.
You can order books, videos, and papers on a large variety of topics which are available from the Rocky Mountain Research Center.
Down stairs in the dome, the large family room has an open staircase to the upstairs and more windows. To the left is the door to the master bedroom, and behind the cameraman is a wood stove that has been used on occasion over the past 16 years, but is only needed if one likes the temperature to be above 70. Springtime is the coolest time underground as the home has used up its heat store from the previous summer's stored heat. And as the days warm up, and the interior temperature attempts to rise, the earth around the building will extract the extra heat, preventing the home from getting too hot during the long hot Montana summers. It then saves that heat for the following winter.
