Real talk: Between diminishing stores and oil wars, fossil fuel-dependance is officially a bad deal. In the future, as these resources get scarcer, we're going to have to figure out how to live in a little more harmony with Mother Earth. Here are 21 houses that are already doing it right: eschewing the power grid for solar, wind, and geothermal energy sources.


Earthship in Taos County, New Mexico, US


Photo: Kayla Sawyer

House with living roof in Ithaca, NY

Photo: Shira Golding Evergreen

Para Eco-House, Tongji University, Shanghai, China


Photo: SDEurope

An off-the-grid house just beyond the Rio Grande Gorge near Taos, New Mexico


Photo: Tolka Rover

Icelandic eco house


Photo: sigkyrre

Zero-emission eco house designed by Potton, UK


Photo: Mike Hales

Greenwich Millennium Eco-Village, London


Photo: Lars Plougmann

La Puerta del Sol in Barrio San Nicolas, Mexico


Photo: Scott & Emily www.wegoslow.com

Richard Carbonnier's tubular eco-house in Pond Inlet, Baffin Island, Nunavut, Canada


Photo: Mike Beauregard

Eco-home in Woubrigge, Netherlands


Photo: Mirjana Chamberlain-Vucic

Eco house at the DC Festival, Washington, DC, 2005


Photo: John Bointon

EcoHome designed by Will Collins. Eco Village Currumbin, Tallebudgera, Australia


Photo: Sander van Dijk

Eco house, Parc Jean Drapeau, Montreal


Photo: Tiago Bortoletto Vaz

Another eco house at Parc Jean Drapeau, Montreal


Photo: Tiago Bortoletto Vaz

BASF eco house, Green Close, University Park, Nottingham, UK


Photo: University of Nottingham

The Brighton Earthship, Brighton, East Sussex, UK


Photo: Dominic Alves

The "Effizienzhaus Plus", Berlin, Germany


Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Eco house prototype by SCI-Arc/Caltech at the Solar Decathlon 2011, Washington DC


Photo: Jim Tetro/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon

Creation of Team Florida at the Solar Decathlon 2011, Washington DC


Photo: Jim Tetro/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon

Parsons NS Stevens' house at the Solar Decathlon 2011, Washington DC


Photo: Jim Tetro/U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon

The solar powered FabLab House, concept by the Instituto de Arquitectura Avanzada de Catalunya


Photo: Denis Doyle/Getty Images

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