Dan Barry's posts

You might want to check into "passive solar heating". If you glaze the outside of the door and air enters low and exits out the top, you could circulate the heat.  Come summer time you might want to close off the system.  You would also want a damper to close off the system in the eveings when there was no sun. There are even examples of tiny solar powered heaters that would circulate the air.  These are designed to stuck on top of car windows to circulate the air.  They might even shut down enough to "close things off " in the evenings.

Just realised you are in Missouri,  bit far away as I will only be around one month this year.

What part of the planet are you in? I am working on my house in Central Texas near Austin this next month.

I am not sure how this will work.  We work and live overseas for the military but will have our Homestead in Texas. I will be working this through next week and will keep you informed. 
     Right now the local power coop has suggested they will drop my metering cost from 20$ a month to 17$ a month if I start making electricity. They will pay for electricity I make at a wholesale fuel cost for power.  If we are away from the homestead 9 months a year we might offset some costs ( this is after the 60 day wait before the area is inspected to allow us to do this).  I will be interested to hear if the rebate would apply to a batch style water heater system.

Travis
   its more than 6 months since you painted your roof. Are you still happy with the paint?  I fixing up a house in central Texas and have lots of roof exposure and would like to hear your present view of painting your roof tiles.  Mine are less then 3 years old and rain is something we dream off and sun something we expect.  Hope you are still arount the site.