An important part of my PhD research has to do with the study of eco-feedback tools, so I started a website, www.ecofeedback.ca, to share some of the neat projects that I've come across. Some of them are market-based solutions, but many of them are design based research which include prototype tools, such as Wn-Wn. It's neat to see all the interesting solutions people have developed to address issues around resource conservation. I can't see to see which ones become more common in the coming years. It's also one of the reasons that I'll likely be slowing down with this here blog for the next little while.
I'm going to be participating the year end design exhibition with a number of other graduate students. Some of the projects are pretty darn cool, I suggest you stop by this weekend and check it out.
Friday April 20-Sun 10am-6pm 1515 Ste. Catherine St. on the 6th & 7th floors of the EV building.
Here's a project I've been working on with the Design Department of University Services of McGill University.
"The Materials Analysis Tool (MAT) is a free online rankingsystem that distills manufacturer informationto assist you in the selection of building products that are more cost effective, healthy and environmentally responsible.
MAT was developed at McGill University as a short cut through the mountains of information provided by manufacturers to designers about their products. MAT isn’t a certification for products, but is rather a database of manufacturer information seen through the lens of sustainability and a way for McGill University staff and contractors to choose products that best reflect the values of the University."
Currently manufacturers are adding their products to the database, and we are hoping that in the next few months the project will become fully functional and used by University Services of McGill University as well as the other institutions in the Montreal area.
I've been keeping busy working on a project with McGill's University Services to develop a tool to help their designers and consultants make more sustainable building and maintenance product choices. The tool is called MAT, short for Materials Analysis Tool.
We are just in the testing stages right now and are hoping to launch mid-to-late September. In the meantime, I'm working on a short promotional video to for McGill's Sustainability Projects Fund, the organization that funded the project.
Here is a little teaser - this short animation introduces the criteria that are used in the framework of analysis for MAT.
More on the theme of energy being everywhere, and in keeping with Braungart and McDonough's Cradle to Cradle, "Waste = Food" concept, below is a short presentation featuring Akinori Ito of Blest Co, a Japanese company that has developed a machine that is able to convert plastics back to fuel oil.
On Monday November 1st, at the at the EQuilibrium™ Housing Forum — True Stories: Sustainability in Action - I've been granted the opportunity to present the the Integrated Design Process for the Abondance, Le Soleil project. I'll be introducing the concept of a design charrette and it's role in the implementation of a systemic, facilitated integrated design process. The conference presents to people in the larger building community the successes and challenges of the development of three net zero home building projects in the province of Quebec.
The fundamental importance of the integrated design process was one of my personal take-away lessons form having participated in the development of the Abondance Montreal project. Not only were we able to understand the project from a variety of perspectives and work out complex design issues as a group - but when challenges arose (and they always do in construction projects), the sense of collective ownership and commitment to the team that was developed through the collaborative design and development process was invaluable in over coming challenges. It's a civil and incredibly democratic way to work.
If you weren't aware there are these advanced homes in the province - you can actually visit the projects to learn more about them. Visiting these sites provide an excellent opportunity to witness the culmination of many years work the teams involved.
We are so married to the systems that currently deliver energy to us - be it hydro, petrol, or coal. Big systems run by big companies for big profit are needed to extract, make usable, and deliver these forms of energy to us. They cost a lot in terms of money and tend to have negative environmental impacts. But energy is everywhere around us - and within us - and we waste it for a lack of creative ways to capture it. But this is changing.
Developed by Jessica Lin, Jessica Matthews, Julia Silverman, and Hemali Thakkar (recent Harvard engineering grads - note: all ladies), the sOccket is a product that takes what energy is readily available in many developing nations - namely many children with a love of soccer - and converts kicks into a usable source of electricity. This is not old school child labour - but a portable generator that encourages play! Apparently, 15 minutes played on sOccket 1.0, could store enough energy to illuminate a small LED light for three hours! The new prototype sOccket 2.0, can power the same LED for the same amount of time with just 10 minutes of play. Imagine how much wood or kerosene this can save a family.
Or how about a night club dance floor that captures the energy of the dancing upon it? There is so much energy wasted at night clubs - not least of which is the energy being expended by all the people writhing about (mostly) to the beat. This kind of thinking, which recognizes the power of movement, can easily be applied to so many places where people move - train station turn styles, for instance, or slightly more exciting/creepy - in the chest cavity - where we breathe with some regularity.
Generally speaking, these tools are not meant to replace all the energy used to power our lives, but rather supplement them - for the time being. In combination with proper energy saving measures, they could eventually become a more important source of energy for all of us. Further, these products help to remind us of the multitude of opportunities for those who think creatively about issues such as energy sourcing and uses - and points to a future where more democratic energy sources abound.
Like a lot of visual learners, I have to write everything down in order to remember them - I write words, pictures and anything that might help me commit certain kinds of ideas to memory. I began studying for the GRE recently and am thereby forcing myself to revisit the high school math that, despite it's purported importance at the time, seems to have been underutilized in my academic and professional life. I forget most of it completely, while the echoes of some rules of logic seem to be trapped in the folds of my grey-matter and tease me continually by their inaccessible presence. So I take notes. I draw pictures. I procrastinate.
While looking for an excuse not to start an algebra review, it occurred to me I might be better able to use the scrap paper I had been using for notes. So I got out my cutting board and hacked a substantial stack of old lecture notes in two.
I then used the three-hole punch to make a few holes on one side. I found an old pasta box in the recycling and cut that to make a front and back to the book, and I bound all the stuff together with a few hinged metal book rings. I'd advise the use of some heavier cardboard stock, but otherwise it's functional, mostly recycled and took no time at all. Sure beats buying a recycled paper "eco-notebook" with a plastic cover in the stores.
I've been collecting wine bottles - attempting occasionally - mostly unsuccessfully - to make drinking glasses out of them. I had a few of these blue Aufkellerein bottles kicking around when the need for more book storage became evident.
After a visit to Instructables.com I found a great idea for this little boozy bookshelf project. And voila - an afternoon, several nights of drinking white wine in the park with my sweetheart, and a trip to the hardware store later: a lovely little place to house the children of my Amazon.ca addiction.
I love glass walls - but they are so blinking expensive. Unless, of course you run a coffee shop with an alcohol licence and a clientele that has a taste forMoosehead. Check out this great glass wall at Le CaffèMariani (4450 Notre-Dame ouest - in St. Henri)
The two sides of the glass wall - stackedMoosehead bottles, stuck together and encased in a thick welded metal frame.
In February, I was fortunate enough to act as the facilitator for a green building charette at École Polytechnique de Montréal. Clearly the students got busy shortly thereafter - because by the end of the semester, they had a completed building on their campus. Defying at least part of the cardinal law of real estate development - thou shall double your budget and timeline in half the time planned - they put this little gem together in no time (e.g. about two months from our meeting in February). No word on the budget - but there appear to be many sponsors for the whole project, so I hope that means this little project won't be haunting departmental budgetary meetings for too long.
The challenge was to design, develop and build a booth for a parking lot attendant that a) does not have to be connected to an energy grid; b) must be thermally comfortable for the occupant; c) while not occupied the internal temperature must stay between 0 and 40°C; and all while being d) collapsible and transportable. No small feat, for a little building.
What they developed is called S.P.A.R.K. - or Solar Powered Autonomous Renewable Energy Kabin - if you want to get all technical. Engineering students and their clever branding! As you can see from the picture, the booth is powered by three 210w Kyocera solar panels, which have been paired with 6 batteries, to allow for energy storage. The wee building will produce 645 kWh annual and is able to store 8.3 kWh.
The students investigated three separate envelop designs and compared their cycle of life impacts on the environment, before choosing to compose the walls of RoxulR22, Enermax pannels and MDF, the ceiling of Pare-air Tyvek, Celfort 300, MDF, and the floor of fibre cement board. The generous fenestration is triple glazed, and allows for substantial solar gains.
What an awesome project! Congrats to Prof. Bernier for offering his students this practical learning experience and here is hoping they have many green buildings in their futures.
Yep, like most bloggers on occasion... I fell off the bandwagon in terms of writing. I'm fine with it. Life's like that. I've been playing acrazyamount ofderbyinothercities and have been loving every moment of it - something has got to give, and it's not going to be work or derby.
Besides writing another thing I haven't been doing very much of is reading for pleasure. However, I did manage to pick up a copy of Dan Pink's A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future while wondering JFK a few weeks ago, and plowed through it on the flight home. I like a writer that theorizes and then gives you the opportunity to put some ideas to practice, and Pink does just that by providing the reader with a goodly number of exercises that one can undertake in order to better get in touch with the creative brain. One such exercise is to maintain a design journal, where you can note (in writing or in images) both good and bad design - in an effort to encourage a higher level of design consciousness within the practitioner. While I would suggest I'm often excited by good design, I must honestly say that I spend more time being critical of bad design and now I have an excuse to compile the two and see if I can learn something in the process. Or at least have a good coffee in the process - which is what happened today:
L'Emporte-Pièce is a new restaurant in the Plateau. It's tiny, really cute and the gentleman behind the counter can make a mean soy-latte. You should go and check it out. And pay attention to the chairs - if you are a fan of the STM you may recognize them - they are old bus seats. The guy behind the counter, presumably the owner (or one thereof), said he bought them from the STM for a steal and refashioned them into seats of the shop. Clever man. They are super durable and look great in the eclectic design of the shop, which seems to be heavily reliant of the clever re-use of a old objects and materials. The coffee appears to be all new though, so don't worry about that.
Today I was privileged enough to participate as a facilitator in a green building design charette at École Polytechnique de Montréal. The charrette was called by Professor Micheal Bernier in order to expose his students to the concept of a design charrette and to allow them to interact with industry experts. The fundamental goal of the day was to refine the design of an off-grid parking attendant booth, which will be constructed by the students prior to the end of the semester. Such a conceptually simple building, so much learning to be had.
Students struggled with balancing the degree to which the building would be insulated, in order to reduce energy demands, with the reality that this would be a small building with it's door often ajar. Further, there was some hope to use a multiplicity of energy systems (e.g. wind and solar), so as to reduce dependence on one source of energy (e.g. the sun). The greater the variety of sources of energy, the less you have to bank on storing said energy for long periods of time. As it turns out, the specification of the building being totally off-grid, in addition the the location of the booth being between a number of large institutional buildings made this a particularly challenging issue. It will be interesting to see what the final product looks like.
Overall, this was primarily an academic exercise, as the students had been working on the particular design exercise since September. Ideally, a charrette would be called at an earlier date - to initiate a creative undertaking, for example, or to try to develop a shared vision for a project. Given the amount of learning required for the students to actually undertake this project, they had only recently developed sufficient expertise to really use the knowledge provided by industry experts this afternoon. It will be an excellent experience for those students interested in pursuing a career that involves regular integrated design sessions, such as those that are part of most complex or particularly sustainable designs.
As a total aside, I noticed that only 4 of the 33 students in the class were women. This kind of strong gender divide is something I never see in business school. Some things are slow to change, I suppose.
Upon moving into my new flat a few years a go, I undertook the fairly typical process of repainting the whole place. Lucky for me, it being a small flat, this only took a few cans of paint (I used Ben Moore's EcoSpec, which has no VOCs) and a few friends. At the end of the day, I was left with a number of empty paint cans and a sense that there was something more that could be done with them than simply dropping them off at the local EcoCentre for recycling.
I was presented with the additional challenge of adequately lighting a beautiful piece of sculptural work that I had just purchased from a friend of mine, Stephen Kawai. That's how I came to create the paint can spot light.
I'm a fan of the "as is section" of Ikea. Often you can find bags of random light fixtures. I like to buy those bags and therefore always have a few random light fixtures in my craft closet. Lamp making is a fun little past time, and a fairly common way to make use of old materials.
After cleaning and spray-painting one of the paint cans, I drilled a hole in the side of the can and placed a white GRUNDTAL fixture at the bottom of it. This is commonly used as a kitchen counter-top spotlight.
On the whole, it's pretty basic, but it works really well. I have a few more cans and ideas for how to make them into neat light fixtures. Another day, another craft project, another post.
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