Eco-Man 4000

Mike Basich is Way Off the Grid… by Scooter Leonard.

Whether it’s taking action photos of yourself with multiple cameras, building your own cabin on a Tahoe peak or starting and running your own company, there is no one even remotely like Mr. Mike Basich. In his latest episode of “How Can I Do It Myself And Cause Less Damage To The Planet,” Mikey took a piece from an 400 year-old, 80-foot pine that fell over on his Tahoe property and went through all the steps to transform it into a good old snowboard.

“Every year companies make way more product that get consumed because that’s their model,” Basich says. “This year I decided to see what it would really take to make a board that I could snowboard on this winter and not feel like it came from a big place with a ton of overhead and profit-hungry investors. Just a simple backyard board.”

So off Basich went to Jay Quintin at Smoking Snowboards, where he made a batch of boards from his milled pine and from some tulip trees that fell on his property in Colfax. Basich breaks down the environmental toll: “These 18 boards took 5 gallons of gas (125 lbs of carbon), 3 gallons of biodiesel (54 lbs of carbon) and approximately 9 kilowatt hours of electricity from the grid (10 lbs of carbon) and three people’s time.” The top sheet and base are none biodegradable and uknown for energy used to produce.

So the known facts here are each board took 10.5 lbs of carbon.” Mike Basich’s carbon footprint may be small, but his inspiration to other riders is mountainous.

Getting the raw materials.

Raw planks.

15″ Planer at work.

Testing out the template shape.

The press.

Pre-shaped core.

Finished product gets the grind.

Basich - ready to shred off the doorstep of his Tahoe mountain cabin.