Nature has provided us with all the knowledge we could ever need to live a sustainable and near self sufficient quality of life. The earth provides us with an abundance of the right materials to create efficient and renewable Eco housing design systems. Adopting them is both simple and cost effective.
Eco-housing is in essence an imitation of what works the best in nature. Take an ecosystem which is a community of living and nonliving things that support and depend on one another. For instance, in a forest ecosystem,some animals eat plants. They digest the plants and make dung, or waste. This waste eventually breaks down. It adds nutrients to the soil. Nutrients in the soil help plants grow. Animals eat the plants, and the cycle continues. People who use ECO construction intend to imitate the sustainable natural world. In these designs they have created housing and other buildings that work in harmony with the surrounding ecosystem. The term Eco-housing refers to this kind of design protocol and evolving construction.
The Eco housing design protocol presented in this section profiles living and neglected examples where every day, everyone is making a positive difference in the world. The standard of living is not compromised yet almost everything is recycled, or used again. Things that can't be recycled break down into soil in the backyard compost heap. These solutions prove that your home, workplace and school can be built from renewable materials (Such as industrial hemp) and almost every thing contained inside of them can be made out of a plant and has advantages over the current!.
They can use heating and cooling systems that rely on clean energy, the kind of energy that does not create pollution. The family car can be made in an eco-friendly factory and out of Eco friendly materials. It also can run on clean energy.These design solutions are already working and can be integrated further into URBAN settings and policed through being included into the building code.
In this section Panacea has provided the digital resource where one can easily add their easy name, e-mail and country to help create the needed public pressure to enforce cheaper and more renewable living by helping get these solutions into the building code.
Buildings made from 100% carbon neutral Industrial Hemp - Numerous advantages
The following education remains neglected. For example - People living in URBAN england at a location called BedZED (BedZED - Beddington Zero (fossil) Energy Development) use fewer natural resources than their neighbors. dwellers use 81 percent less energy to heat their homes , 45% less electricity and 58% less water. This comprises 82 houses 14 apartments and a workplace for 100's of people including an arts center and a day care center.Most of the windows in the homes there face south. In the northern part of the world, the sun crosses the sky in the south. When the sun shines into south-facing windows, it gives extra warmth to homes. None of this protocol is presently required in the current building code for future building yet is the only way to create the best energy efficiency.
Green roofing also known as "living roofs", serve several purposes for a building, such as absorbing rainwater, providing insulation, creating a habitat for wildlife, and helping to lower urban air temperatures and combat the heat island effect. There are two types of green roofs: intensive roofs, which are thicker and can support a wider variety of plants but are heavier and require more maintenance, and extensive roofs, which are covered in a light layer of vegetation and are lighter than an intensive green roof. Green roofs are used to: Reduce heating (by adding mass and thermal resistance value) A 2005 study by Brad Bass of the University of Toronto showed that green roofs can also reduce heat loss and energy consumption in winter conditions.
Reduce cooling (by evaporative cooling) loads on a building by fifty to ninety percent. Especially if it is glassed in so as to act as a terrarium and passive solar heat reservoir — a concentration of green roofs in an urban area can even reduce the city's average temperatures during the summer. Reduce stormwater run off — see water-wise gardening. Natural Habitat Creation — see urban wilderness.Filter pollutants and carbon dioxide out of the air which helps lower disease rates such as asthma — see living wall. Filter pollutants and heavy metals out of rainwater. Help to insulate a building for sound; the soil helps to block lower frequencies and the plants block higher frequencies. If installed correctly many living roofs can contribute to LEED points. Increase agricultural space.
The Ford motor Rouge Center's Living Roof. The Ford Motor Company reopened one of its oldest car factories.Called the Ford Rouge Center, the factory is in Dearborn, Michigan. The building has many green features. One of the most striking is its living roof. Ordinary factory roofs are covered with shingles or metal. These hard surfaces allow rainwater to run off the rooftop quickly. Factory roofs are often coated in dirt and grime from the factory. When rain falls on an ordinary factory rooftop, the rainwater picks up dirt and pollution. The dirty water eventually flows into lakes and rivers. Putting plants on rooftops instead of shingles or metal helps prevent this kind of pollution. The plants trap dust and dirt, so they don't wash away in the rain. And plants absorb carbon dioxide, which helps reduce a building's carbon footprint. The Ford Rouge Center has the largest living roof in the world. It stretches across 10 acres (4.2 hectares). It is planted with sedum. This colorful, low growing plant can survive even without much rainfall. Birds and insects make their homes in the sedum. Best of all, the living roof is constantlyworking to purify the water and air.
Cities can adopt this into the building code or set regulatory targets for Urban change over much like the fuel standards and emissions reduction targets, yet this remains non existent in the building code but has a superior capacity for real time progress.
This concept can be extended like in the case of the BedZed residents where they enjoy little rooftop lawns and can grow their own vegetables and flowers if they wish. The Earthship Eco house designs use their own grey water for home food production and do it effectively.
Earthship Eco housing designs
Not only can the office and home be made out of Industrial hemp , most of the CONTENTS of both can be made from this material (there are estimated to be 29,000 uses). These show superior advantages that no other building materials or raw materials can match.
Why is Industrial Hemp neglected and not in the building code? We should take a quick look at the state of the current construction industry:19 % of the carbon footprint left by the UK is a result of building and infrastructure.In Australia, 40% of the total country's waste comprises building waste.Homes now account for 27% of our family carbon footprint.In 2002, 68% of total energy consumed was in buildings. This figure has improved but still stands at 40%.A significant 5% of the world's greenhouse gases result from cement production.These sombre facts demonstrate a problem so let's look at how the properties of hemp can lighten the load:Hemp is a Carbon Positive Resource: Carbon Positive is better than carbon neutral; hemp building is suitable carbon sequestration.Affordable: Building with hemp is affordable; it can compete well with cheap prefabricated veneered brick.
Thermally Efficient: Due to low density, hemp building materials have excellent thermal insulation properties.Resistant to Pests: Hemp has great rodent resistive properties and due to the lime used in these materials, hemp buildings are termite proof.Fire Resistance: Hemp building materials have excellent fire resistant properties making it a great choice for those living in areas prone to bush fires.Impressive Strength: Hemp is very strong and flexural, so for places subject to tornados or earthquakes, it provides a safer alternative. This also means that structures require fewer materials to reach the same strength as with conventional building materials - further adding to the cost and environmental benefits of this material.Hypo-allergenic: Allergies are common these days and many building materials contribute to the problem; hemp however, is hypoallergenic. "Breathable" walls are produced when constructed from hemp; which can help to balance the temperature & humidity of rooms so there are no mould problems; mould being a constant problem for allergy sufferers.
This property makes it an ideal choice for anyone living in areas with wide ranging temperatures - either day/night or season to season. Having "breathable" walls creates very comfortable rooms indeed. Excellent Sound Insulation: For the same reason that hemp building materials provide great thermal insulation, they offer excellent sound proofing properties also.
Render Friendly: Walls can be finished with regular building renders. Opting for a pure lime render, with a range of great coloured minerals to add, ensuring the benefits of your hemp walls are enjoyed with style.Recyclable: Walls made from hemp can be broken down and reused again! Alternatively, this material is suitable for direct use as a fertiliser.Healthy Home Environment: Approved by Building Biologists - This adds to the value of your home.Maintain Future Property Value: Running costs are important to buyers; hemp buildings are low-cost and so retain future value.Truly Environmentally Friendly: Unlike many other building products that boast "green" properties and benefits, hemp is a truly sustainable building method.
The governments of the world intend to use taxes, subsidies, and trading schemes to assign a monetary value to resource consumption, energy, emissions, and waste, effectively establishing an exchange constant. Not only is none yet large enough to make big changes in the way we can reduce any of these, there remains no proposed amendments to the curricular and building code to include unmatched ECO building materials such as HEMP. This is despite the ECO design solutions in this section and HEMP housing materials being the most carbon neutral solution POSSIBLE.
Currently students of engineering and material science have to make no material-related decisions to minimize eco-impact. It is the same in the building code yet these design solutions are already in effect and making the only possible difference. These real life examples allow the scientist or engineer to analyze and respond to environmental imperatives in a far greater capacity than taxes or trading schemes could ever achieve.
As engineers and scientists, ethics must be the first responsibility, to use our particular skills to guide design decisions that minimize or eliminate adverse ecoimpacts. Properly informed materials selection and ECO house design is a central aspect of this task. Energy, carbon footprint, recycle fraction and toxicity, have obvious ecoconnections and need amendments to the building code and curricular to effectively attack the source and not just treat the symptoms.
The ecology of cities and towns requires a comparative approach. The unprecedented growth of cities and towns around the world, coupled with the unknown future effects of global change, has created an urgent need to increase ecological understanding of human settlements, in order to develop inhabitable, sustainable cities and towns in the future. Although there is a wealth of knowledge regarding the understanding of human organization and behavior, there is comparatively limited information MADE AVAILABLE regarding the ecology of cities and towns.
Living examples of these design solutions are present.What is not present is a pledge from governments and the UN to organize leading scientists, landscape designers and planners from developed and developing countries around the world, to LEARN, TEACH and explore urban ecological research. To emulate what has been undertaken to date, what has been learnt, where there are gaps in knowledge, and what the future challenges and opportunities are.
The work place must and can also do their part. Menara Mesiniaga is a skyscarper in Malaysia that is cooled by fresh tropical breezes. In the very building code can these neglected solutions be enforced other than just having a green building certification system.
So far the green building certification system provides a third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built by using strategies intended to improve performance in metrics such as energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts. This however does not enforce these solutions, only by including them into the building code can they be in effect to capacity.
The rest of the worlds parliament houses are needed to set a public educational example. The German parliament are already doing so, however why isn't it a focus of the United nations to sponsor a such an educational theme to help other countries educate their public in the same mannor?.
In the center of the German parliament the observation deck is a collection of 360 mirrors. Together, the mirrors
form an upside-down cone. The cone is beautiful
to look at, but it also serves an important
purpose. When sunlight hits the cone, the
mirrors reflect the light down into the chamber
where parliament meets. During the day, the sun
and the mirrors provide light for the chamber.
This design saves energy, since people do not
have to use electric lights in the chamber during the daytime.
There are many others advantages in using the dome design, Buckminister fuller, Earthships and the monolithic domes take advantage of these earth quake and hurricane proof structures.What is remains alarming is when a rebuild of a country occurs after an earth quake or hurricane the dome design is not used to prevent further damage. EarthShip are the only ones working on no budget who are attempting to provide this security, this knowledge is not in the building code despite its proven effectiveness.
Understanding a site and what a building does to it has been a primary concern of architects, engineers, landscapearchitects, and contractors, as well as many other professionals, for decades.The warning signs began with the 1962 publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which illustrated how the actions of humans had transformed the natural world in ways they never anticipated.
Carson demonstrated that the use of pesticides in agriculture was damaging the natural environment, our food supply, and the health of some wild animal populations. The influence of Carson's book in green design circles cannot be overstated and was evident in later books, like Ian L. McHarg's Design With Nature, from 1967, which focused primarily on placing cities within the larger contexts of regional watersheds and geological development.Today these solutions need their place in our curricular and legislation. Linking the builder with the eco system means to become integral with the larger ecological forces that sustain us, there is no other way to survive.This is a true life skill.
The buildings included in this section do more than convey an image or help educators illustrate the relationship between the built and natural world.Adopting the following changes to all cities along WITH new building codes can achieve a real time energy saving and pollution reduction solution.This is a new standard in public health which is available today BUT REMAINS NEGLECTED.
All cities could be learning and benefiting from the following:US cities reducing their fossil fuel usage by 50% by using sewage sludge as a fuel.-As a result of a demonstration project partly sponsored by the United States Environmental Protection Agency in cooperation with the Indianapolis Center for Advanced Research, the City of Indianapolis, Indiana, realized a 34% fossil fuel savings by incinerating sewage sludge. At the same time, sludge throughput was increased 10%. In addition to these proven savings, operational downtime for repairs was reduced, maintenance costs were reduced, and air pollution was reduced.
The air pollution reduction allowed Indianapolis to cancel a $3,000,000 construction program for air pollution abatement. Other cities incinerating sewage sludge in the United States that have initiated the fuel efficient mode of operation have saved even more fuel than Indianapolis. Nashville, Tennessee, reduced its fossil fuel usage 40%; Buffalo, New York, reduced its fossil fuel usage by 47% from design expectations; Hartford, Connecticut, reduced its fossil fuel usage by 51%; and Jacksonville, Florida has reduced its fossil fuel usage by over 50%. These are not oil reserve tanks. They are sewage treatment tanks. The fuel of the future for every city around the World. The citizens of the cities contribute to this renewable fuel supply 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year.Source
The concerns we have with the global water crisis must be solved by DESIGN. Eco housing designs solve this issue, especially with waste water management treatments.The Eco housing sustainable water treatment make conventional designs and their problems redundant. Conventional treatment uses environmentally harmful chemicals (namely chlorine) to disinfect effluent following precipitation of solids (sludge) from the wastewater stream.
The Ecological treatment method uses biological processes instead of chemical inputs. Systems like LIVING MACHINES: Clean, Green Waste-Water Recycling is the only sustainable water strategy and technology for wastewater treatment in direct alignment with the World Health Organization's current recommendations for addressing the global water crisis. Yet it is not enforced through the building code or taught at the faculty level, how can the current system support progress this way?
Converting sewer sludge to fresh water is no easy job; traditional treatment plants unnecessarily consume massive amounts of money, energy, and resources. The Living machines concept, now called "Eco-Machine" by inventor John Todd solution for waste-water management re-envision the process as an eco-conscious endeavor, conserving water and reducing overall treatment costs with minimal sludge disposal, water purchases, sewer surcharges, and chemical use. They resemble a tropical forest and use plants to clean up water. These consist of a series of ecosystems that work together to break down water contaminants, whilst teaching that natural and eco-friendly alternatives are the only way to replace costly traditional water treatment plants.
This cost-effective, renewable design is a proven solution to the growing global wastewater crisis. It has already proven its effectiveness in transforming the problem cities face with their water supplies. ECO machines cleaned up Appalachia's water supply.This technology remains "under the glboal radar" despite it already been positioned as an educational tool at Oberlin College, they have also popped up at resorts, lake restoration sites, and even at chocolate maker Ethel M's factory in Nevada.
Worrell water technologies who have created a similar form of waste-water management called Living machines.These remain the only UNINFORCED sustainable waste water management systems in the world. Despite this, faculties have continue to have no role in this education, do they even have any plans to help implement them? NONE as far as we can tell.There is a lot of potential in wastewater bio reactor designs to produce clean water and electricity for existing cities. There are also bio reactor designs intended to retrofit into the existing city infrastructure.
There already a few present "ECO theme resorts" which can serve as a practical example and move towards a future building code.This combined with a coordinated publicity program must serve a task for the increased public focus on sustainability and energy efficiency.Eco resorts have started to appear, however instead of all resorts getting an educational package for what systems to change over too and or any incentives, they are going to get hit with a carbon tax.
Urban structures can progressively change over and adapt these systems THROUGHY through amendments to the cirricular.Future office and housing continues to be built with out these solutions.These the Urban change over plans are non existent, yet the proof of their capacity is already there. Cities building design protocols can also be improved with Vertical farming for food security including Aquaponics for carbon neutral organic food production.
The theme and ideals of self sufficient Eco communities can be transformed into cities through these modern design solutions. In this section Panacea has outlined a number of designs for modern urban change over to eco housing and self sufficient eco communities. Currently we can offer training in HEMP building , but all these design solution need a center to teach them for sustainable development. Can you help us erect such an institute?Please contact Panacea-BOCAF
In Conclusion
Housing codes and regulations - these must reflect the function of the Eco building designs to have real human well being in their capacity -The Carbon negative ECO housing building code is higher education and can only come into play in real time by public participation or public pressure. Please help and sign the petitioning on this page.If you are intent on building a carbon zero or negative carbon Eco house or building, you should have all the incentive and encouragement available. The building code regulation can enforce this.A pertinent point is, that regulatory means must not take years to assimilate Eco housing designs into the building practice, as years is some thing that we dont have, that statement is understood in all circles.
It is necessary and extremely important to address the issue of the complete ecological footprint of the human race. The youth of today will also have to take note of the population growth in the future, whilst taking care to work to introduce further ecological re-balancing of the conditions on this planet THROUGH DESIGN SOLUTIONS. We know this is important. You also know this is extremely important. However, this type of knowledge has not - as of yet - received widespread public grant-support, and is not currently taught in all school curricula.
Furthermore, it is not mandated by law.We here at Panacea-BOCAF are aware of the fact that working designs, focused on integrating water-purification, energy-creation, and green building systems are without doubt the most important steps to take - in order to ensure the conservation of our planet's natural flora and fauna - and therefore the physical and mental health of human beings on this planet. Some of the fundamentals are, for instance, sustainable treatment of wastewater, and retention of water acquired during storms.
Self-sustainable ecological housing planning that moves forwards into off-the-grid decentralized communities are specifically designed for ensuring conservation. Preservation of local cultures also ensues - moving from the town-level all the way down to the neighbourhood-level. What we consider a perfect introductory example of a successful model of this concept
Quote: Each neighborhood and group of neighborhoods in a zone or culture in the town is a partial modular mini-replica of the town, in terms of security, self-sustainability, and local community sharing of resources such as utilities (energy, water), security, elderly and child care, education, elders council, entertainment, co-op food, and materials farming and crafts production.
All these systems including David Fishers Green Building designs from Spinning Towers to Seawater Greenhouses are based on the essential work and progress of architects, engineers and ecologists who are incorporating working, sustainable technological concepts into all of their design projects.
There is a multitude of solutions - solutions which are easily comprehended and absolutely feasible - including the design science worldview of Buckminster Fuller (key notes would be the Dymaxion House and the Dymaxion Deployment Unit - which are precursors of ecological, selfsustainable living systems that are portable, dependable, and tornado-proof.). In addition to Buckminster Fuller we would also like to point out the following Eco-housing designs.
The following are engineering ETHICS which have been done by Affordable Environmental Homes. These must be implemented into the building code.
* To provide affordable housing for those in need.
* To design and build homes of high quality yet low maintenance.
* To design and build self sustainable homes utilising smart technology.
* To design and build homes thermostatically stable and fire resistant.
* To design and build homes in harmony with the environment and natural resources.
* To design and build non-toxic homes sensitive to the wellbeing and health of families.
* To design and build homes that provide privacy, space and peace of mind.
The Business Concept-The business concept of AEH Affordable Environmental Homes Project is to design and build for the people of Australia complete packages of Affordable, Quality, Sustainable, Environmental and Smart Homes and Housing Estates that meet the Community’s futuristic requirements. -End
You, who are in charge of an institution, an aid-agency, or are a politician - you, who are a member of the general public, you can assist this sustainable development. Please contact Panacea-BOCAF.
The Panacea University can additionally make available the following research books (under construction).
