Porcupine Office Building

The 40,000 square foot office building sports an array of aluminum “reeds” that are all arranged in the same direction to incorporate passive solar heating into the structure and regulate its temperature— thus saving energy.

The prickly looking extensions are arranged in such a fashion that they allow early morning winter sun to go through to the interior of the building unabated, while hot summer sun at noon would be blocked off. Apart from making a grand and distinct visual statement, it also keeps the rain away as it continues to save energy in the form of the building’s heating and cooling needs.

Read more: http://www.greenpacks.org/2009/04/14/passive-solar-design-porcupine-office-building-takes-shape-in-the-uk/#ixzz0zNa1UoH6

Green School

An old cold war barracks has in germany has been converted into a school.

major design features.

1 micron thickness solar pannels across 5000 square metres of roof.

the thinness of the pannels makes them semi translusent letting light flow into the building but also absorbing most of the heat.

The sidewalls have windows that open automatically to allow natural ventilation and fresh air to flow freely into the school. The construction has kept intact the original concrete floor and support beams of the 4,400 square meter building.

Classrooms are modular and highly insulated, and have climate control facilities. This reduces the energy load vastly. The newly opened school is the first in a project that will use the existing buildings located on the site to create a science and learning center.

Read more: http://www.greenpacks.org/2010/08/30/amazing-solar-school-from-old-armory-building/#more-9126#ixzz0zNYauazl

Apocalypse

Synonyms:
Annihilation
Catastrophe
Devastation
Cataclysm

Definition:

a prophetic revelation, esp. concerning a cataclysm in which the forces of good permanently triumph over the forces of evil.

Does that make us the evil ones?

D

The Glass Bead Game

While looking into the last blog the writer mentioned a link with a fictional novel called the glass bead game.

The Glass Bead Game takes place at an unspecified date, centuries into the future.

The rules of the game are only alluded to, and are so sophisticated that they are not easy to imagine. Playing the game well requires years of hard study of music, mathematics, and cultural history. Essentially the game is an abstract synthesis of all arts and scholarship. It proceeds by players making deep connections between seemingly unrelated topics.

The reason this is relevant is because i think the 'game' draws some very neat parallels with our current situation of sustainable systems. implementing sustainable systems requires linking several areas of expertise. connecting them in such a way that they compliment each other and exist as a single almost perfect system.

The glass bead game deals with similar issues of finding the links between seemingly unrelated topics.

Diagrams of the Future

Some notes from the blog of Lebbeus Woods' Eight diagrams of the future.

"Who says we cannot know the future? We can, but it always a matter of interpretation, that is, of imagination."

"knowing the present is also always an act of imagination. We gather the facts, at least the ones available, or the ones we want, and describe what is happening around and within us. It is always an act of invention. If—following the conventions of our social group—enough people agree, then we have an accurate description of reality, the truth that Voltaire called (referring to history), “the lie commonly agreed upon.”"

http://lebbeuswoods.wordpress.com/2010/08/08/eight-diagrams-of-the-future/