Also ask around friends and family - in my experience lots of folks keep a couple old machines they no longer need because they don’t want to throw them out (or pay extra to throw them out) and once folks know you as the old computer guy you might be surprised at how many people message you to be like ‘you want this?’ before they throw something out.

And if that doesn’t work, there’s always free groups like Buy Nothing and Everything is Free online, usually local to your town or city.

Corporations and universities often have ewaste bins but getting access will depend on your circumstances. I find them there, clean them up, and pass them to a local refugee resettlement charity.

Your local recycling center may be accepting volunteers - I’ve been working with a guy who volunteers at our recycling center and he’s been working on setting up a reuse option for all the working laptops that come through. Currently their policy is that all computers must be securely destroyed to protect peoples’ information but if he can catch them and get permission to wipe the drives and give them away then he’s allowed to do so. He also saves hundreds of TVs and monitors per year - he could do more, tons still get thrown out, but they have some tight space limitations at the center and have already been giving him as much space for storage and organization as they can.

Also proplifting is easy as can be with succulents. You can pick leaves up off the floor around the display and just set them on some dirt at home. Next thing you know you have a new plant.

Good points! I suspect the ‘even thickness’ thing came from broken up concrete pads/sidewalks/patios, where the result would be irregulary shaped on X and Y but somewhat consistent for Z depending on how well they prepped the site for the slab. In that case it might end up pretty similar to landscaping rock. In some of the photos you can see they have a much flatter top and much more irregular edges and undersides.

100% agreed on demolition practices. There’s a lot of potential in deconstruction for reclaiming building materials rather than consigning them to the waste stream. The tradeoff is in time, person hours (my grandfather once claimed a truckload of bricks from a demolished mill to build the family fireplace - my mother and her siblings weren’t allowed to come inside that summer unless they chipped cement off some bricks and brought them with them). And in materials/energy - blades for a concrete saw and power to run it, perhaps. I’m sure there are other ways to get more-or-less regular building blocks but they’ll have some cost to balance against the good of saving the materials and reducing the need for new manufacturing. Either way, there’s some cool potential. Treating rubble or urbanite like quarried stone I think fits the solarpunk ethos.

Thank you for the details on bonding concrete! I’ve used cement to patch some holes in custom-shaped, 45° concrete blocks I made once (didn’t shake all the air pockets out of the first couple) so I knew you couldn’t just stick concrete to concrete, but not how to actually go about it when you had to. I’ll refer back here if I need to fix it someday, or if it comes up in any of my stories.

Thanks!

TBH this is some really basic wiring stuff. You identify three differently colored wires, match them to three terminals, and tighten three screws. The same attachment system is in every outlet and light switch in your house.