Roadmap 2050 / Office of Metropolitan Architecture / Rem Koolhaus

I read a really interesting story in the newspaper recently about the Office of Metropolitan Architecture (created by Rem Koolhaus) which has come up with a re design for the whole infrastructure of Europe, to share  renewable energy, in a grid system.

"The proposal's starting point is the fact that renewable energy sources such as wind and sunshine are erratic and unreliable, which means they have to be supported by other forms of power. But they are also available in different quantities in different places – wind is abundant in Britain, sun in Spain – and in different seasons. The big idea is to create a power network across the continent linking all these sources, which could then compensate for each other. If it was windless in Britain but sunny in Spain, power could travel from them to us, and vice versa.

This is a political, as well as a technical proposal. "You can use this project to create integration. It creates a very pragmatic reason to integrate," says De Graaf. It coincides with work the OMA has been doing for several years on the ways that the European Union represents itself, through their design and research subsidiary AMO, which "operates in areas beyond the traditional boundaries of architecture". Koolhaas is a member of the EU's Reflection Group, whose job is to think about what might happen a decade or two hence."

(Rowan Moore) Full story on the Guardian website (LINK) 

Ecobuild 2010

Earls court.

The usual products were on display this year, and I didn't spend long in the main hall, looking around. I did attend several interesting seminars though, including a series on  Urban planning and the public Realm. This included a series on the following: 'Making space for food', 'Incorporating trees' and 'Can healthier environments be designed?'

 Martin Kelly, managing director of  Capita Lovejoy chaired the series called 'Incorporating trees' which was interesting as he came to give talks on the same subject during a focus week at university, which I found really compelling. I am finding more and more that trees are a major consideration I have whilst designing a Landscape, and that there importance is becoming something that I am quite passionate about. 

"Trees are widely understood to be central to a better environment, and this seminar explores concerns and practicalways to include more trees in urban and peripheral environments, how they can mitigate urban heating, and how to manage their ongoing maintenance."  

The other Lectures which really had an impact where the series called 'Can healthier environments be designed?' in particular a seminar given by Rachel Hine, who is the Assistant Director, Interdisciplinary Centre for Environment and Society, University of Essex. She spoke about The therapeutic effect of nature, and the impacts on mental health, which is very relevant for me, as the title of the CS Essay (dissertation) I am writing at the moment is: Ecopsychology; The effect of nature and Landscape architecture on the human psyche. The research that has been done at the University of Essex by Rachel Hine is really interesting. What really interests me is the suprisingly strong correlation between the decrease in mental health in the UK and the rate of Urbanisation, indicating that people are healthier if they have easy access to green space.

http://www.cabe.org.uk/files/the-value-of-public-space.pdf

CABE document on the values of of public space. V interesting. Touches on economical issues, values of public space in terms of health and mental well being, values from biodiversity and nature, moving between public space etc etc. . . 

14/01/10

"The Co-op, UK

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BrightFarm Systems is part of the winning team chosen to develop a master plan for the redevelopment of an eight-hectare site in central Manchester, United Kingdom. Our design team was chosen by global engineering firm Arup to develop carbon neutral, local food production systems."

http://brightfarmsystems.com/projects/the-co-op-uk

Brightfarm systems are involved in several interesting projects based around urban agriculture and other design solutions to environmental and sustainability issues. One project that they have built, which interests me particularly is The  Science Barge, located on the Hudson river New York. It is a barge which demonstrates systems which can be used to create an entirely sustainable food production using renewable energy, to the public. The designer of the barge itself was Ted Caplow, who is the executive director of New York Sun Works Centre for Sustainable Engineering.

http://brightfarmsystems.com/projects/nysw-usa

Video prepared by Arup (global engineering company). Showing the transformation of a city (Manchester) into a system using rooftop food production, smart bus systems and turning buildings into photovoltaic and algae generators.

Richmond Park

3 November 2009

We visited Richmond park with Micheal Hermann, in order to have talks with park ranger Adam Curtis, Adams job is crucial to the management of Richmond park. The talk with him was very beneficial to us for part of our university course, (a writing project based on investigating the management of a meduim scale site; I am looking into the management of Burgess Park, for example). We also had a small talk from part of the police force which patrols richmond park. The park has its own police force, which is unusual for a park, but a couple of the royal parks employ this management strategy, we were told that the park had a very low crime rate and one of the major problems it encountered was people picking mushrooms and chestnuts, to take home. This causes problems for the deer, as this is a crucial part to their diet in the winter. Speaking to the police officer was really interesting, as he pointed out things like this which i hadn't really considered before. I come from the countryside which if managed at all, is managed by farmers, so to be somewhere which felt like the countryside, but was so intensely managed was interesting to me. Things that I would just take for granted were thought through and had some sort of system. I found the experience very useful; I now understand the full scope that Landscape management can have, and exactly how much work goes into managing such a huge area as Richmond park.

Adam mainly spoke to us about a new gate which is being put into the park to commemorate the building of st pauls cathedral. The gate is close to King Henry VIII's Mound, which is the highest point in the park, and has a view to st pauls cathedral, 10 miles away. The view from the mound to the dome is protected for a dome and a half 's width either side of the cathedral. The gate is positioned at the start of this view before a slice is cut through the woodland framing the site. We were asked our opinions on several designs for the new gate, some referring to the nature in the park some referring to royalty, or echoeing small features found on the cathdral itself. The designs were interesting and things which were taken into account were interesting, such as health and safety, wether or not the gate would fit into the park and wether or not it was making enough of a statement to commemorate. We were told that whichever way you chose one group of people will be unhappy with it, so the best option is to aim to compromise on all aspects of anything. nightmare. Some of the more beautiful and original designs were just not considered for this reason. One design was of two deer fighting with their antlers entwined when the gate was closed; to open the gate the deer raise their heads, and the antlers unlock. It was a fantastic design challenging the conventional way in which a gate is opened, but for health and safety reasons the design would have to be altered to open in the conventional way, if it were to be considered. I found looking at the designs really interesting and the way in which they are considered for use interesting, but a little depressing as a designer. on the way out of the park we came across a herd of deer, with huge antlers, very beautiful.  

  

Knollmead Permaculture Centre, Surbiton.

27/10/2009

"Permaculture is an approach to designing human settlements and perennial agriculturalsystems that mimics the relationships found in natural ecologies. It was first developed by Australians Bill Mollison and David Holmgren and their associates during the 1970s in a series of publications. The word permaculture is a portmanteau of permanent agriculture, as well aspermanent culture."

The site was designed about 18 years ago using the Permaculture philosophy of combining gardening and nature conservation. The site is next to Knollmead primary school and the area is shared with allotment owners to one side. There are several aspects of the site which are brought by members who contribute to the upkeep of it, eg. a bee hive which is positioned near the small shed and seating area. above is where a pond is being dug and ditches to improve the drainage to the site. I found the whole idea of permaculture interesting, and aspects of it very sensible and useful, however the idea that nothing should be distrurbed at all is in a few senses impractical, and even on this site things were being changed adverse to the concept behind permaculture. For example I found the outside toilet and the the idea behind it a very sensible and actually would be useful to improve the impact we have on the environment, the example on the site didn't make the idea seem appealing, however once the practicalities of it were explained I could see how this idea could successfully be used in peoples homes even. i liked also the community the site created, it seemed to bring together people from the community that would maybe not get together otherwise.

V + A Teach In 

12 October 2009

I attended the Teach-In at the Victoria and Albert Museum, which was a series of lectures and talks based on environmental issues, sustainability, global warming and climate change. The first lecture was from Richard Hawkins, on Climate Safety, which was really interseting, informative and terrifying- Predictions that by 2040 all ice will have melted and predictions that when the permafrost melts the amount of Co2 and Methane released will be higher than all emissions now. The second lecture was on Ecological Literacy by Jody Boehnert, she introduced to us the six degrees of climate change, a future scenario featured in Ecomag No. 1 (June 2009). Which were a series of beautiful illustrations and artistic interpretations by six different artists responding to the book 'Six degrees' by Mark Lynas,

 which was compiled from hundreds of scientific papers describing the projected changes with each degree of climate warming. (see below)

Artwork: Kate Evans. 1 Degree: "Consider the thought that living species, which have evolved on this planet over millions of years, could be destroyed for ever in the space of one human generation."
Artwork: Airside. 2 Degrees: "A three degree rise in global temperature - something that could happen as early as 2050 - effectively reverses the carbon cycle. Instead of absorbing Co2 vegetation and soil starts releasing it in massive quantities, as soil bacteria work faster to break down organic matter in a hotter environment, and plant growth goes into reverse. ... in other words the Hadley centre's team had discovered that carbon cycle possible feedbacks could tip the planet into a runaway global warming spiral by the middle of this century ..."
Artwork: Rob Hunt. 3 Degrees: " For an anologue of the three degree world we have to go back ... before the earth its regular cycle of ice ages and interglacial. We have to go back a full 3 million years, to a period of time called the Pliocene. Continentals glaciers were almost entirely absent - contributing to a sea level 25 metres higher than todays. ... if emissions go on rising as they are , global temperatures could shoot past 3 degrees as early as 2050."

Artwork: Jamie Slimmon. 4 Degrees: "Poplulation will be flocking north, to overcrowded refuges in the Baltic, Scandinavia and the British Isles... but with habitable areas becoming more and more crowded, conflict may come sooner rather than later even in temperate civilised Europe."

Artwork: Jody Barton. 5 Degrees: "With five degrees of global warming, an entirely new planet is coming into being - one largely unrecognisable from the Earth we know today... Humans are herded into shrinking zones of habitability by the twin crises of drought and flood."

Artwork:Leona Clarke. 6 Degrees: "Hotter oceans bring hurricanes, far outdoing anything we see today. these superhurricanes (Hypercanes) wil have enough energy to the North pole and back, perhaps even allowing them to repeatedly circumnavigate the globe."

There were then lectures from Andrew Simms, Emma Dewbury and Ben Gill on Ecological Debt, Nurturing ecological habits of mind in Design and One planet living respectively. Also speaking were Jonathon Crinion, Creativity: A Social Ecological Approach, Stephanie Hankey, Design Activism and John Thackara, Three Step plan for Universities. All lectures were interseting, but some more than others, I didn't last til the end of the day; i found it an awful lot of information to take in at one time.