Dennis Odin Johnson has been designing, manufacturing and building environmentally green homes and dome homes since 1971. His company, Natural Spaces Domes, is one of the leading manufacturers of geodesic dome homes in the world. During his 37 years of building domes, one of his major focuses has been educating and promoting the green aspect and environmental sustainability of dome homes as well as all home designs in general. During the early 80’s Dennis designed many earth bermed and earth covered homes.
His experience working for 10 years as an architectural designer and project manager for an architectural firm in Los Angeles and Minneapolis, provided him with the experience to creatively design homes that are universally adaptable and environmentally sustainable.
In the early 1970's, Dennis taught energy efficient home design in the Minnesota State College system. He promoted and sold solar heating systems, solar photovoltaic panels, wind electric generators, composting toilets, methane digesters producing power, solar food cookers and even solar cigarette lighters! (although HE never smoked). His commitment to the health of the Earth has always been evident in the design and production of all of his structures. Dennis has been an active environmentalist for 45 years and continually directs his energies toward protecting the Earth and its children.
Dennis acts as a consultant to people all over the world who are wanting to build a green home or remodel an existing structure.. Of course, his preference is a Natural Spaces Dome structure which is designed and built using very sustainable building practices. His dome structures are built all over the world including the US, Canada, Spain, Brazil, Greenland, Denmark, Finland, Romania and soon Norway.
The most recent example of his environmentally sane dome homes is the new Bear Creek Dome, in North Branch, Minnesota, just north of Minneapolis and St. Paul. It is located on 50 wooded acres with 8 other domes including his original dome home, the Natural Spaces Domes office and 2 domes used for manufacturing. Check out the website to see a list containing many of the environmental aspects of the new Bear Creek Dome.
Some of the major green and sustainable advantages of Dennis's dome homes are:
• His Natural Spaces Domes use 60% less structural materials in building the dome's outer shell (in contrast to a conventional, comparable box house), making his domes extremely resource efficient.
• The spherical shape of the dome deflects tornadoes and hurricanes, making it one of the strongest lightweight structures around, able to withstand winds over 200 miles per hour.
• The phenomenal strength of the dome shell can withstand snow loads in excess of 150 pounds per square foot.
• For the environmentally sensitive home owner, most of the structural wood framing materials are FSC Certified and the plywood is formaldehyde free. The interior panels of the dome shell are made from spruce wood boards that do not need to be finished with any chemical sealers or paints.
• Insulation levels created in his dome homes have extremely high R-values, ranging from 44 to 77. His domes provide simple, inexpensive building methods allowing thicker walls which, in turn, allow for more insulation (of any type). Focusing on designing a building for the next seven generations, he believes in the “sustainability cost”, which is defined as the cost to tomorrow's global society.
Bear Creek Dome
Bear Creek Dome is located in North Branch, MN on Bear Creek, 50 miles North of Minneapolis / St. Paul. It has 3 bedrooms, office, kitchen, dining room, living room, media area, laundry and 2 1/2 baths. It is 3,200 sq. ft on two floors, one upper bedroom has an additional loft. The dome is a 49’ diameter, 4 frequency, ½ truncation dome.
Sustainable Design Techniques include:
• 18” thick dome walls and roof with an R-value of 55.
• Frost Protected Shallow Footing (FPSF) to increase home energy efficiency due to insulated slab edge
• Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) Certified wood
• Triple pane skylights and windows to reduce heat loss in the winter and heat gain in the summer
• Extensive use of dead or downed lumber harvested from this 50 acre site.
• Radiant floor heating system in the main floor concrete slab.
• No carpeting used in the entire dome, greatly improving indoor air quality.
Natural Spaces Domes is a licensed Minnesota contractor (LIC# 7806). They specialize in working with owner-builders and owner-contractors and are members of the NAHB (National Association of Home Builders). A more important affiliation is their membership in and support of EEBA (Energy & Environmental Building Association). They participate in their training seminars and constantly review, investigate and implement the latest, most accurate data and information on building energy efficient, healthy to live in, environmentally friendly houses.
Dennis’ Natural Spaces Domes continues to provide a simple pre-engineered dome building system that is a true representation of his commitment to help people live in a safer, healthier, more energy efficient, and certainly more interesting environment.
