High Desert Institute

Projects

Project Guilds Description Links
Open Observatory Astromancers' Guild A comprehensive public kit designed to help communities build their own observatories at their land projects. It provides detailed guides, examples, and specifications for various components of an observatory, enabling groups to create dedicated spaces for astronomical observation and education.
Very Small Array Astromancers' Guild A distributed software project for microcontrollers and single board computers using affordable software defined radio (SDR) hardware to collaborate on Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI).
Complex-Futures.org Toolkit Complex Futures Guild A reusable “Community Health & Environment Toolkit” that lets neighborhoods measure problems and conditions, turn that into forecasts, and uses the results to drive policy briefs, campaigns, and concrete demands.
Microgrids and Storage Energimancers' Guild Developing systems to produce, store, and distribute renewable energy locally, creating resilient islanded power networks.
Solar Panel Construction Energimancers' Guild Researching and building photovoltaic cells from scratch using accessible materials, moving beyond simple installation to true manufacturing independence.
Wind Turbine Construction Energimancers' Guild Designing and fabricating wind turbines from scratch, utilizing 3D printed components and custom-wound stators.
Crowdfunding Campaigns Fundweavers' Guild Organize and manage crowdfunding campaigns to support specific community projects.
Grant Writing Workshops Fundweavers' Guild Host workshops to train community members in the art of writing effective grants for non-profit projects.
High Desert Community Development Fund Fundweavers' Guild A nonprofit initiative to build and manage a safe, diversified portfolio of passive index funds to support HDI's operational costs and programs.
High Desert Community Land Trust Fundweavers' Guild A separate nonprofit created to own the lands we buy, with an extremely narrow focus and careful rules to insulate risk and secure ownership forever.
Major Gifts and Bequests Fundweavers' Guild Cultivate relationships for major gifts, endowments, and planned giving to secure the long-term future of the institute.
Desert Water Solutions Hydromancers' Guild Researching and developing technologies for water sourcing in arid environments, with a primary focus on atmospheric water generators (Air Wells) to extract moisture from the air.
EMP Shielding Lorekeepers' Guild A project to shield the library from the potential effects of electromagnetic pulses.
Librarian Lorekeepers' Guild A free, open-source digital librarian that runs on local hardware, answers questions from your own Library, and stays connected to the mesh via Meshtastic.
LocalNet Lorekeepers' Guild A resilient off-grid application stack that gives every outpost a local digital hub for knowledge, AI, and mesh-integrated services.
Open Zine Project Lorekeepers' Guild An open library of zines covering permaculture, mutual aid, and community resilience.
PubSub Lorekeepers' Guild A C++17 Notcurses reader/publisher for RSS, Atom, JSON, Meshtastic, via http/https/ipfs/ipns/tor/etc with logic bots.
The Library Lorekeepers' Guild A free, open Library-in-a-Box that preserves everything HDI learns about living well off-grid and makes it available to every outpost.
All Seeing Eye Pathfinders' Guild A 3D printed structure containing broad spectrum sub-GHz Meshtastic VLBI elements for distributed RF observation.
Cyberpony Express BBS Pathfinders' Guild The bulletin board software that powers Cyberpony Express, providing resilient store-and-forward messaging across the mesh network.
Cyberpony Express Pathfinders' Guild A free, encrypted, public mesh network based on Meshtastic. It is designed to be a free, open-source, digital postal service for the people.
Flying Robots Pathfinders' Guild Low-cost quadcopters, rovers, and solar boats coordinated via the Cyberpony Express mesh to handle logistics, observation, and disaster response.
Fox Hunting: Community Policing Pathfinders' Guild Developing skills and tools for radio direction finding to maintain the integrity of the Cyberpony Express mesh network and locate interference.
Meshtastic-LLM Pathfinders' Guild A tool for connecting local LLMs to the Meshtastic network.