The Brighton Earthship , an award-winning eco community centre, has hosted environmental education events and community activities for almost a decade. The unique building is turning to friends, fans and past visitors to help switch it back on. Earthship Brighton, located in the South Downs National Park, is an off-grid eco-building designed to get all the electricity and drinking water it needs from the sun and the rain. The Low Carbon Trust needs to raise £20,000 in 30 days to acquire a new ultraviolet water filtration system to purify rainwater for use inside the building, purchase new batteries to store electricity generated by the solar panels, and build a straw bale unit to securely house the new batteries. When the Earthship was built back in 2006, lead-acid batteries were the only technology available to store renewable electricity from the solar panels. Like any battery its life is limited. And a decade later the technology has moved on. New regulations also mean that we need better ways to purify the rainwater the building collects, to convert it to drinking water.
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