Eco village technology
Eco village technology and AI for intentional communities
Software and AI for eco villages and intentional communities: shared tasks on a 3D map of your land, proof of work, credits, and tools your community owns.
An eco village runs on two kinds of energy: the sun, the soil and the water on one side, and the goodwill of its members on the other. The first is well served by technology, from solar arrays to greywater systems. The second usually runs on a whiteboard, a group chat nobody can search, and the memory of whoever has been there longest. That is where most eco villages lose people: not to a failed harvest, but to work that nobody can see, credit that never quite gets given, and decisions that nobody wrote down.
Green Fire builds eco village technology for the second kind of energy. This page covers what we build, how an eco village uses it, and the principles behind it.
What an eco village actually needs from software
Most intentional communities we talk to want the same few things.
One shared picture of the land. Where the gardens are, which buildings are going up, where the water lines run, what the next phase looks like.
Shared work that people can see. Who is doing what, what is finished, what is stuck, and what a new member could pick up on their first weekend.
Fair credit. Whether the community pays for work, trades hours or simply keeps a record, people need to trust that effort is seen and counted honestly.
Decisions on the record. Council and consensus are slow on purpose. The decision should not have to be made twice because nobody remembers it.
Data the community owns. Member details, photos of the land, conversations about money. None of it should live on a platform that can change its terms or sell it.
Civil X, our eco village software
Civil X is the tool we built for that list. Everything in it starts from a 3D map of your land, with your areas and your projects drawn on it.
Tasks on the map. Every task has a place. A member opens the map, sees the orchard needs mulching, and takes it. A steward sees at a glance which parts of the land have work waiting.
Proof of work. A task can carry a before photo and an after photo. Each photo is fingerprinted when it is uploaded, so the record of work cannot be quietly changed afterwards. Over a few seasons that becomes a visual history of the land, which is also the best fundraising material an eco village will ever have.
Credits on a ledger. Completed work earns credits on a ledger where every entry is chained to the one before it. Each community decides what credits mean: paid work from a project budget, hours that count toward membership, or recognition alone. Civil X never holds or moves money. If work is paid, the community's own steward approves and pays it their own way.
Field and office. A crew lead runs Civil X from a phone in the field, with big buttons and photos. A coordinator plans on a large screen in the office. Both see the same land.
Your own copy. Each community gets its own copy of Civil X with its own database, so your members, photos and records are never mixed with anyone else's.
Eco village AI, used carefully
AI is useful in an eco village wherever there is repeat work that nobody wants: drafting the weekly update, turning a voice memo from the field into a task, sorting volunteer applications, reminding people what they signed up for, preparing a grant report from the record of work already done. We build AI dashboards that do that work and ask a person before anything goes out. Jordan runs his own touring business on one, every day, which is how we learned where the mistakes happen.
What AI should not do in an intentional community is decide. It does not accept members, settle disputes, allocate land or speak for council. We build so the machine can prepare everything and a person always presses the button. Read more about AI for land projects.
The bioregional layer
An eco village is part of a watershed and an ecoregion, and the best communities organise with their neighbours, not only inside their fence. Our open source BioRegional OS gives a community its regional picture, from soil and stream gauges to the species recorded nearby, and a protocol for working on shared projects with consent and council review built in. For site design, see permaculture AI.
Showing people what you are building
Many eco villages are trying to raise money or bring in members for something that does not exist yet. An interactive 3D map of the land, with each phase on its own layer, does more in one minute than a long document. We build those maps, and short films that walk through the land and the software together. See the interactive 3D work.
The principles behind it
We think eco village technology should be solarpunk technology: local first, owned by the community, light enough to run on an old phone at the edge of a field, and designed to get people looking at the land rather than the screen. Our tools have no streaks and no notifications designed to pull people back. A community has its own rhythm, and the software should follow it.
Common questions
What is eco village technology?
Eco village technology covers the tools an eco village uses to live sustainably and work together: renewable energy, water and food systems on the physical side, and software for shared tasks, credits, decisions and land planning on the community side. Green Fire builds the community side.
What software do eco villages use?
Many eco villages use a mix of group chats, spreadsheets and shared documents. Purpose built options like Civil X put tasks, proof of work and credits on a map of the land, and open source tools like BioRegional OS add regional ecological data and a protocol for shared decisions.
How can AI help an eco village?
AI helps most with repeat admin: drafting updates and reports, turning notes into tasks, sorting applications and sending reminders. It should prepare work for people to approve, not make community decisions. Green Fire builds AI dashboards on that rule.
Does Civil X handle payments?
No. Civil X records work and credits, and each community decides whether those credits are paid from a budget, counted as hours, or kept as a record. Any money moves through the community's own methods, approved by its own people.
Can a community land trust or retreat center use this?
Yes. Civil X works for any group that shares work on a piece of land: eco villages, community land trusts, retreat centers, regenerative farms and builders developing a new community.