Paul Wheaton is an American

permaculture Permaculture is an approach to land management and settlement design that adopts arrangements observed in flourishing natural ecosystems. It includes a set of design principles derived using Systems theory, whole-systems thinking. It applies t ...

author,Stollar, R.L
“Paul Wheaton and Permaculture”
Eugene Daily News. Retrieved January 4th 2013.Fredrickson, Erika
"Grow Wild" Missoula Independent. Retrieved May 26th, 2020.
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master gardener Master Gardener programs (also known as Extension Master Gardener Programs) are Volunteering, volunteer programs that train individuals in the science and Landscape design, art of gardening. These individuals pass on the information they learned ...

software engineer Software engineering is a branch of both computer science and engineering focused on designing, developing, testing, and maintaining software applications. It involves applying engineering principles and computer programming expertise to develop ...

,Bushman, Margie
"Integrating Animals in Permaculture Systems with Paul Wheaton"
Santa Maria Times. Retrieved January 4th, 2013. and disciple of the natural agriculturist

Sepp Holzer 260px, A rainwater harvesting landscape designed by Holzer in Tamera, Portugal Josef "Sepp" Holzer (born July 24, 1942, in Ramingstein, State of Salzburg, Austria) is a farmer, an author, and an international consultant for natural agricultur ...

. He is known for writing his book, ''"Building a Better World in Your Backyard"'', founding Permies, the largest website devoted to permaculture, as well as for creating and publishing articles, videos, and

podcasts A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. Typically, a podcast is an episodic series of digital audio files that users can download to a personal device or stream to listen to at a time of their ...

on the subject of permaculture. Wheaton is also the founder of Coderanch, formerly called ''Javaranch'', an online community for

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

programmers. He received three Jolt Awards from

Dr. Dobb's Journal ''Dr. Dobb's Journal'' (often shortened to ''Dr. Dobb's'' or DDJ) was a monthly magazine published in the United States by UBM Technology Group, part of UBM. It covered topics aimed at computer programmers. When launched in 1976, DDJ was the fi ...

for his work related to Javaranch. As a software engineer, he has worked on the ground system for the

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

that took pictures for

Google Earth Google Earth is a web mapping, web and computer program created by Google that renders a 3D computer graphics, 3D representation of Earth based primarily on satellite imagery. The program maps the Earth by superimposition, superimposing satelli ...

and

DigitalGlobe DigitalGlobe was an American commercial vendor of space imagery and geospatial content, and operator of civilian remote sensing spacecraft. The company went public on the New York Stock Exchange on 14 May 2009, selling 14.7 million shares at U ...

. Wheaton has participated in several documentaries,

TED Talk TED Conferences, LLC (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an American-Canadian non-profit media organization that posts international talks online for free distribution under the slogan "Ideas Change Everything" (previously "Ideas Worth Sprea ...

shows, and conferences, on topics related to permaculture, energy, and

software engineering Software engineering is a branch of both computer science and engineering focused on designing, developing, testing, and maintaining Application software, software applications. It involves applying engineering design process, engineering principl ...

Early life

Paul Wheaton was born in

Moscow, Idaho Moscow ( ) is a city and the county seat of Latah County, Idaho. Located in the North Central Idaho, North Central region of the state along the border with Washington (state), Washington, it had a population of 25,435 at the 2020 United States ...

, and raised in

Eastern Oregon Eastern Oregon is a region of the U.S. state of Oregon. It is not an officially recognized geographic entity; thus, the boundaries of the region vary according to context. It is sometimes understood to include only the eight easternmost countie ...

and

Missoula, Montana Missoula ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Missoula County, Montana, United States. It is located along the Clark Fork River near its confluence with the Bitterroot and Blackfoot rivers in western Montana and at the convergence of five ...

. He began his career as a

and continued to work for several private companies with software and

programming Program (American English; also Commonwealth English in terms of computer programming and related activities) or programme (Commonwealth English in all other meanings), programmer, or programming may refer to: Business and management * Program m ...

. In the early 1990s, Wheaton developed Bananacom, a

terminal emulator A terminal emulator, or terminal application, is a computer program that emulates a video terminal within some other display architecture. Though typically synonymous with a shell or text terminal, the term ''terminal'' covers all remote term ...

, which was used by

bulletin board system A bulletin board system (BBS), also called a computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running list of BBS software, software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user perfor ...

operators in the United States. At one time, Wheaton had hired 14 programmers from

to work on the Bananacom project. The product gained popularity among its users due to its usability. Later in 2000, Wheaton worked on the ground system software for the spacecraft that took pictures for Google Earth and DigitalGlobe.

Projects

Permies

In 2000, Wheaton shared his views on

lawn A lawn () is an area of soil-covered land planted with Poaceae, grasses and other durable plants such as clover lawn, clover which are maintained at a short height with a lawn mower (or sometimes grazing animals) and used for aesthetic an ...

care on his website richsoil. Later that year, he launched the website Permies, a place for people to discuss lawn care and permaculture. By 2012, Permies had become the largest online community dedicated to permaculture and homesteading. Wheaton first documented on Permies his design of natural homes. Called the Wofati, it is a type of natural earth-sheltered building developed by

Mike Oehler David Michael Oehler (; January 2, 1938 February 2, 2016) was an American environmentalist and author. He was a proponent and designer of affordable and sustainable alternative forms of housing. He became well known for his appearance in episodes ...

and expanded upon by Wheaton. Wheaton coined the acronym, which means Woodland Oehler Freaky-cheap Annualized Thermal Inertia. "Woodland" because it is the optimal location for such a building; "Oehler" after the pioneer, "Freaky-cheap," due to the Fairly-cost effective or frugal materials; and Annualized Thermal Inertia from a book by John Hait called "Passive Annual Heat Storage" which inspired much of the reasoning behind the Wofati design. The site has attracted notable personalities such as

Geoff Lawton Geoff Lawton (born 10 December 1954) is a British-born Australian permaculture consultant, designer, teacher and speaker. Since 1995 he has specialized in permaculture education, design, implementation, system establishment, administration and c ...

and

Toby Hemenway Toby Hemenway (April 23, 1952 – December 20, 2016) was an American author and educator who wrote extensively on permaculture and ecological issues. He was the author of ''Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture'' and ''The Permacultur ...

rocket mass heater A rocket mass heater (RMH), also known as rocket stove mass heater, is a form of slow-release Thermal radiation, radiant heating system, designed to primarily heat people and secondarily to warm areas in Sightline, line of sight around it. Variat ...

developers Ernie and Erica Wisner, medical

herbalist Herbal medicine (also called herbalism, phytomedicine or phytotherapy) is the study of pharmacognosy and the use of medicinal plants, which are a basis of traditional medicine. Scientific evidence for the effectiveness of many herbal treatments ...

Michael Pilarski, and others who explore a range of eclectic permaculture topics.

Coderanch

In 1997,

Kathy Sierra Kathy Sierra (born 1957) is an American computer programmer, programming Teacher, instructor, video game developer, game developer, author, and the curator of Intrinzen Education and career Sierra attended Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with a major in ...

created javaranch.com, which she transferred to Wheaton In January 2000. In 2009, Javaranch was extended to a new

domain A domain is a geographic area controlled by a single person or organization. Domain may also refer to: Law and human geography * Demesne, in English common law and other Medieval European contexts, lands directly managed by their holder rather ...

coderanch.com with a

forum Forum or The Forum may refer to: Common uses *Forum (legal), designated space for public expression in the United States *Forum (Roman), open public space within a Roman city **Roman Forum, most famous example * Internet forum, discussion board ...

. As of May 2020, Coderanch had more than 3 million posts created by over 332,000 registered members.

Publications

Books and articles

Paul Wheaton authored the book ''"Building a Better World in Your Backyard, instead of being angry at the bad guys."'', which was an iteration of his philosophy of choosing to ''"build good things rather than be angry at bad guys."'' According to Wheaton, the book describes a collection of things people can do individually to make a significant positive global impact. He is also the author of many

article Article often refers to: * Article (grammar), a grammatical element used to indicate definiteness or indefiniteness * Article (publishing), a piece of nonfictional prose that is an independent part of a publication Article(s) may also refer to: ...

s, published both on his own website and other major publications. A Wheaton's article on

Hügelkultur Hügelkultur (, alternative spelling without umlaut: Huegelkultur), literally mound bed or mound culture, is a horticultural technique where a mound constructed from decaying wood debris and other compostable biomass plant materials is later (or ...

appeared in

LifeHacker ''Lifehacker'' is a weblog about life hacks and software that launched on 31 January 2005. The site was originally launched by Gawker Media and is owned by Ziff Davis. The blog posts cover a wide range of topics including Microsoft Windows, M ...

in 2011, which suggested the use of

wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...

to form the backbone of Hügelkultur bed. His article on

Aphids Aphids are small sap-sucking insects in the Taxonomic rank, family Aphididae. Common names include greenfly and blackfly, although individuals within a species can vary widely in color. The group includes the fluffy white Eriosomatinae, woolly ...

and

ants Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total of ...

was published on ''Countryside''.

Podcasts

In 2011, Wheaton launched a monthly

podcast A podcast is a Radio program, program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. Typically, a podcast is an Episode, episodic series of digital audio Computer file, files that users can download to a personal device or str ...

titled ''"Paul Wheaton Permaculture Podcast"''. The podcasts mainly consisted of interviews with notable figures in permaculture and educational discussions on various topics of permaculture. In 2019, his Permaculture Podcast ranked number 2 in Feedspot's ''“Top 15 Permaculture Audio Podcasts & Radio You Must Subscribe and Listen to in 2019."'' Wheaton has also participated in other podcasts such as thesurvivalpodcast.com, in which he discussed various topics including Sepp Holzer, ''wofati'', permaculture

profitability In economics, profit is the difference between revenue that an economic entity has received from its outputs and total costs of its inputs, also known as surplus value. It is equal to total revenue minus total cost, including both Explicit co ...

, rocket mass heaters, light bulbs, and irrigation, and on ''The Pagan Homesteader'' podcast where they discussed Hügelkultur and Wofati. Wheaton has also expressed his positions on energy saving methods in a podcast hosted by ''Abundant Edge''. Wheaton has been featured on The Joe Gardener podcast on the basics of hugelkultur.

Other media

In 2008, Wheaton created his YouTube channel called ''paulwheaton12'' which had over 86,000 subscribers and 24 million views as of June, 2020. In his videos, Wheaton discusses various topics related to permaculture, which includes

organic horticulture Organic horticulture is the science and art of growing fruits, vegetables, flowers, or ornamental plants by following the essential principles of organic agriculture in soil building and conservation, pest management, and heirloom variety pres ...

s, natural building, alternative energy,

homesteading Homesteading is a lifestyle of self-sufficiency. It is characterized by subsistence agriculture, home preservation of food, and may also involve the small scale production of textiles, clothing, and craft work for household use or sale. H ...

frugality Frugality is the quality of being frugal, sparing, thrifty, prudent, or economical in the consumption of resources such as food, time or money, and avoiding waste, lavishness or extravagance. In behavioral science, frugality has been defined as ...

, raising chickens,

wildcrafting Wildcrafting (also known as foraging) is the practice of harvesting plants from their natural, or 'wild' habitat, primarily for food or medicinal purposes. It applies to uncultivated plants wherever they may be found, and is not necessarily limited ...

aquaculture Aquaculture (less commonly spelled aquiculture), also known as aquafarming, is the controlled cultivation ("farming") of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, mollusks, algae and other organisms of value such as aquatic plants (e.g. Nelu ...

, paddock shift systems, and

colony collapse disorder Colony collapse disorder (CCD) is an abnormal phenomenon that occurs when the majority of worker bees in a honey bee bee colony, colony disappear, leaving behind a queen bee, queen, plenty of food, and a few nurse bees to care for the remaining ...

. His videos also include interviews with

and other notable people in the field of permaculture. He further presented his findings during his TEDTalk, "REALLY Saving Energy: Paul Wheaton at TEDxWhitefish".

Interviews

In 2019, Wheaton was interviewed by Peak Prosperity about his book, ''"Building a Better World in Your Backyard (Instead of Being Angry at Bad Guys.'' In 2020, Wheaton was also interviewed by Mike Nowak and Peggy Malecki about the ''"Building a Better World in Your Backyard (Instead of Being Angry at Bad Guys"'' book as well as his general thoughts and beliefs on permaculture.

Other projects

In 2013, Wheaton produced a

documentary A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

wood-burning stove A wood-burning stove (or wood burner or log burner in the UK) is a heating or cooking appliance capable of burning wood fuel, often called solid fuel, and wood-derived biomass fuel, such as sawdust bricks. Generally the appliance consists of a s ...

s, highlighting sustainable ways to heat, which consisted of four segments called ''"Fire Science"'', ''"Sneaky Heat"'', ''"Boom Squish"'', and ''"Hot Rocket"''. The documentary was distributed in

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

s, in addition to

online streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

and downloadable videos. According to Wheaton, his design of wood burning stoves uses 1/10 of the wood compared to conventional wood burning stoves. He also claimed that his stoves only produce 1/1000 of smoke compared to other stoves. In 2014, Paul Wheaton crowd-funded and produced a deck of Permaculture

Playing Cards A playing card is a piece of specially prepared card stock, heavy paper, thin cardboard, plastic-coated paper, cotton-paper blend, or thin plastic that is marked with distinguishing motifs. Often the front (face) and back of each card has a Pap ...

, where each card contained information about a different permaculture technique or notable people of permaculture. Later in the same year, Wheaton produced another documentary titled ''"World Domination Gardening"'', which featured a 3 days workshop of Hügelkultur, earthworks,

ponds A pond is a small, still, land-based body of water formed by pooling inside a depression, either naturally or artificially. A pond is smaller than a lake and there are no official criteria distinguishing the two, although defining a pond t ...

, and swales. The documentary was distributed in sets of three DVDs, called ''"Sealing a Pond Without a Liner"'', ''"Ditches and Swales"'', and ''"Hugelkultur and Terracing"''. In 2015, Wheaton launched a

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

project to make a documentary of rocket mass heaters. The documentary has been distributed in DVDs, streaming media, downloadable video files, and

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

plans. In 2017, Wheaton hosted a ''Permaculture Design Course'' and an ''"Appropriate Technology Course"'' which consisted of a 14 days workshop. The project was able to raise the pledged funds within 22 hours after its Kickstarter project was launched. Later in 2018, Wheaton produced a documentary called ''"Rocket Ovens"'', which he described as an efficient way to cook and bake food making less than 1% of the carbon footprint of that of an electric

oven upA double oven A ceramic oven An oven is a tool that is used to expose materials to a hot environment. Ovens contain a hollow chamber and provide a means of heating the chamber in a controlled way. In use since antiquity, they have been use ...

. Distributed in DVDs and streaming videos, the documentary featured environmental friendly ways of cooking, baking, and dehydrating food with lesser amount of wood compared to other forms

wood-fired oven upA double oven A ceramic oven An oven is a tool that is used to expose materials to a hot environment. Ovens contain a hollow chamber and provide a means of heating the chamber in a controlled way. In use since antiquity, they have been use ...

Experiments, demonstrations, and opinions

Wheaton set up an experiment to demonstrate how

compact fluorescent lamp A compact fluorescent lamp (CFL), also called compact fluorescent light, energy-saving light and compact fluorescent tube, is a fluorescent lamp designed to replace an incandescent light bulb; some types fit into light fixtures designed for incan ...

s (CFL bulbs) are not better than

incandescent light bulb An incandescent light bulb, also known as an incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe, is an electric light that produces illumination by Joule heating a #Filament, filament until it incandescence, glows. The filament is enclosed in a ...

s. He used a combination of warm clothing, incandescent lights that produce heat as well as light, and various heating devices to keep warm while his 700 square foot house in Montana is set for 40 degrees Fahrenheit all winter. With this demonstration, Wheaton concluded that by heating the person instead of the air, a person can remain comfortable and save hundreds of dollars in energy savings. Wheaton introduced a lifestyle model called ''Wheaton Eco Scale'' in 2010 where he categorized different lifestyles into 10 levels, where level-0 makes the highest

carbon footprint A carbon footprint (or greenhouse gas footprint) is a calculated value or index that makes it possible to compare the total amount of greenhouse gases that an activity, product, company or country Greenhouse gas emissions, adds to the atmospher ...

and level-10 makes the lowest. In 2011, Wheaton demonstrated how hand washing a standard sized load of dishes can only use around a gallon of water. This is in contrast to modern, energy-efficient

dishwasher A dishwasher is a machine that is used to clean dishware, cookware, and cutlery automatically. Unlike dishwashing, manual dishwashing, which relies on physical scrubbing to remove soiling, the mechanical dishwasher cleans by spraying hot wat ...

s using less than per load but a significant improvement to the typical water usage during hand-washing of . In 2014, Wheaton produced a documentary on

mason bees Mason bee is a name now commonly used for species of bees in the genus ''Osmia'', of the family Megachilidae. Mason bees are named for their habit of using mud or other "masonry" products in constructing their nests, which are made in naturally ...

which was featured in

TreeHugger ''TreeHugger'' is a sustainability website that reports on news, and other subjects like eco-friendly design, homes, and gardens. It was rated the top sustainability blog of 2007 by Nielsen Netratings, and was included in ''Time'' Magazine's ...

. In the documentary, Wheaton compared mason bees with

Honey bees A honey bee (also spelled honeybee) is a eusocial flying insect within the genus ''Apis'' of the bee clade, all native to mainland Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the ...

and what humans can do to help, which included keeping bees in

refrigerators A refrigerator, commonly shortened to fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to its external envir ...

. Wheaton has performed testing for heating a person rather than a whole house to save 90% on a heating bill while staying warm.

References

External links

Permies: permaculture website and forum

Wheaton's blog

Paul Wheaton's page for events at his property, "Wheaton Labs"

"Building a Better World in Your Backyard, instead of being angry at the bad guys" book on Amazon

"Skip: Skills to Inherit Property" book by Paul Wheaton and Mike Haasl on Amazon
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wheaton, Paul Living people American gardeners Organic gardeners Permaculturalists American sustainability advocates Writers from Missoula, Montana American software engineers Year of birth missing (living people)