The End of an Era: The Need For New Design

Eli Morris Lichter Marck

I wish to speak a word for nature, for absolute freedom and wilderness, as inhabitant, or a part and parcel of Nature, rather than a member of society. for there are enough champions of civilization: the minister and the school

contrasted with a freedom and culture merely civilto regard man as an I wish to make an extreme statement, if so I may make an emphatic one, committee and everyone of you will take care of that. Henri D. Thoreau, Walking 1862

An Introduction (and a Myth) There was once a time when people lived in harmony with the land. When subsistence came easily and was sought on a day-today basis. People moved freely, their movements checked only by the changing of the seasons and political relations with neighbors. This was the time of hunt and gather. Then came the Neolithic revolution. For the first time in human history people colonized large tracts of land for subsistence. Communities amassed storehouses and built kingdoms, empires, and religious oligarchies upon them. From Peru to the Mississippi Valley, China to Mesopotamia, subsistence farming took hold. A number of examples exist of people rejecting this trajectory (archaeological findings in the American southwest suggest that the Pueblo anastazi People resisted the powerful agricultural influence of their southern neighbors for over a thousand years). Eventually, however, the Neolithic revolution swallowed up all but a select few. Revisionists claim these few examples are proof that this revolution was not inevitablethat it was not a giventhat dependence on subsistence farming meant more work hours for the majority and too few for the privileged. In other words, foreign trends forced people to give up their freedom and accept farming. But that is all history. Our lives take place in the next chapter of the story, which began, according to Michael Pollan, the day in the year of 1947 when the huge munitions plant in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, switched over to making chemical fertilizer (Ominvores Dillemma 41). The industrial revolution brought us steam engines, mechanized factories, new working conditions, mass transit, communications, etc however, it was not until after World War II did food production became part of the industrial machine. Until then, farmers we limited to the capability of their given plot of land. The German chemist Fritz Haber changed everything. Habers discoveries kept Germany in the war much longer than expected. He discovered poison gases like ammonia, chlorine, and Zyklon B (used in Hitlers concentration camps). The synthesis of artificial nitrate nitrogen was his most notable discovery. As long as the Nazis had nitrate nitrogen they could keep building bombs. 6

However, Habers discovery turned out to fuel more than the war effort. In 1920, Haber won the Nobel Prize for his application of synthetic nitrogen to artificial fertilizer. According to Pollan, figures as large as two in every five humans on the planet are alive due to Habers discovery. Nitrogen is an essential element plants sequester from soil. Habers discovery allowed people to produce their own supply of nitrogen. By doing away with this limiting factor industrial standards became applicable to the world of food production. Today, according to Pollan, every 1 calorie of food we produce takes 1 calorie of fossil fuels. Around the world, we commit over 800 million hectares of land to soil-based agriculture. In the next fifty years an additional 109 hectares will be need to feed the growing population of our planet (Despommier). The burden will be too heavy a burden on our planets ecosystem; Imagine a world where basic resources like water, food and air drive people to social discord and violent conflict. We must, therefore, open a new chapter in the history of our species. We must begin a new revolution. The technological revolution is well underway. Computers, global communications, Internet, and new social values all suggest a turning away from the habits of the industrialized world. As in the previous examples, food production methods lag in the race toward revolutionary change. Nevertheless, technological advancements in subsistence methods offer too many solutions to be put off any longer. According to Dr. Dickson Despommier, the ushering in of a new system of food production is essential, given the benefits and the adverse consequences. A new system could: 1. Supply enough food in a sustainable fashion to comfortably feed all of humankind for the foreseeable future 2. Allow large tracts of land to revert to the natural landscape restoring ecosystem functions and services 3. Safely and efficiently use the organic portion of human and agricultural waste to produce energy through methane generation, and at the same time significantly reduce populations of vermin (e.g., rats, cockroaches) 7

4. Remediate black water creating a much needed new strategy for the conservation of drinking water 5. Take advantage of abandoned and unused urban spaces 6. Break the transmission cycle of agents of disease associated with a fecally-contaminated environment 7. Allow year-round food production without loss of yields due to climate change or weather-related events 8. Eliminate the need for large-scale use of pesticides and herbicides 9. Provide a major new role for agrochemical industries (i.e., designing and producing safe, chemically-defined diets for a wide variety of commercially viable plant species 10. Create an environment that encourages sustainable urban life, promoting a state of good health for all those who choose to live in cities. And all this not to mention the ethical implications for rebuilding of natural ecosystems, eliminating our dependence on fossil fuels, eliminating the idea of waste, and the reversal of the global warming process. To quote Richard Neutra (Survival Through Design 1954): Architecture is a social art. It becomes an instrument of human fate because it not only caters to requirement but also shapes and conditions our responses. It can be called reflective because it mirrors a program of conduct and living. At the same time this art of a planned environment does more, it also programs our daily conduct and our entire civilized life. It modifies and often breaks earlier established habits. Breaking habits that we cant afford not to keep is a question of ethical necessity. I have included at the start of this pamphlet David Holmgrens twelve principles of permaculture against which all advancements in the world of food production and design at large should be judged. 8 It has become imperative that in designing our physical environment we should consciously raise the fundamental question of survival, in the broadest sense of the term. Any design that impairs and imposes excessive strain on the natural human equipment should be eliminated, or modified in accordance with the requirements of our nervous and, more generally, our total physiological functioning. This principal is our operational criterion in judging design or any detail of man-made environment, regardless of how difficult it may seem to apply the principal in specific cases. To the biologically minded, mastery of nature does not mean reckless perversion of her forms and processes, but rather the art of attuning mans ways to her order. Design, never a harmless play with forms and colors, changes outer life as well as our inner balances. The art of design can associate itself with scientific skill, and do so without an inferiority complex. Natures forms grow quite differently but they often are models for those designs which man produces, accepts, and, before long, strangely tires of. Naturalness can be regained when the acceptance of design is guided physiologically and not just commercially pushed. -Richard Neutra (excerpts from Survival Through Design 1954)

David Holmgren, 12 Principles of Permaculture Design

1. Observe and interact - By taking the time to engage with nature we can design solutions that suit our particular situation. 2. Catch and store energy - By developing systems that collect resources when they are abundant, we can use them in times of need. 3. Obtain a yield - Ensure that you are getting truly useful rewards as part of the work that you are doing. 4. Apply self-regulation and accept feedback - We need to discourage inappropriate activity to ensure that systems can continue to function well. 5. Use and value renewable resources and services - Make the best use of natures abundance to reduce our consumptive behavior and dependence on non-renewable resources. 6. Produce no waste - By valuing and making use of all the resources that are available to us, nothing goes to waste. 7. Design from patterns to details - By stepping back, we can observe patterns in nature and society. These can form the backbone of our designs, with the details filled in as we go.

VS.

8. Integrate rather than segregate - By putting the right things in the right place, relationships develop between those things and they work together to support each other. 9. Use small and slow solutions - Small and slow systems are easier to maintain than big ones, making better use of local resources and produce more sustainable outcomes. 10. Use and value diversity - Diversity reduces vulnerability to a variety of threats and takes advantage of the unique nature of the environment in which it resides. 11. Use edges and value the marginal - The interface between things is where the most interesting events take place. These are often the most valuable, diverse and productive elements in the system. 12. Creatively use and respond to change - We can have a positive impact on inevitable change by carefully observing, and then intervening at the right time.

Source: The Raven Anarchist Quarterly

10

11

The State of Things: Industrial Agriculture, Mono culture, Fossil Fuels, Pollution

12

13

It took hundreds of millions of years to produce the life that now inhabits eartheons of time in which that developing and evolving and diversifying life reached a state of adjustment and balance with its surroundings. The environment, rigorously shaping and directing the life it supported, contained elements that were hostile as well as supporting. Certain rocks gave out dangerous radiation; even within the light of the sun, from which all life draws its energy, there were short-wave radiation with power to injure. Given timetime not in years but in millennialife adjust, and a balance has been reached. For time is the essential ingredient; but in the modern world there is no time. -Rachel Carsons Silent Spring 1962

14

15

Degradation of the land: Desertification and Erosion of Top Soil

Over the past century, the use of fossil fuels has grown nearly thirty fold, and industrial production has increased more than fifty fold. The bulk of this increase, about three-quarters in the case of fossil fuels and little over four-fifths in the case of industrial production, has taken place since 1950. The annual increase in industrial production is perhaps as large as the total production in Europe around the end of the 1930s. Into every year we now squeeze the decades of industrial growthand environmental disruptionthat formed the basis of the pre-war European economy. Environmental stress also arise form more traditional forms of production. More land has been cleared for settled cultivation in the past 100 years than n all the previous centuries of human existence. Interventions in the water cycles have increased greatly. Massive dams, most of them built after 1950, impound a large portion of the river flow. In Europe and Asia, water use has reached 10 per cent of the annual run-off, a figure hat is expected to rise to 20-25 per cent by the end of the century. Desertification the process whereby productive arid and semi arid land is rendered economically unproductiveand large-scale deforestation are other examples of major threats to the integrity of regional ecosystems. Desertification involves complex interactions between humans, land, climate. The pressures of subsistence, food production, commercial crops, and meat production in arid ad semi arid areas all contribute to this process. Each year another 6 million hectares are degraded to desert-like conditions. Over three decades, this would amount to an area roughly as large as Saudi Arabia. More than 11 million hectares of tropical forests are destroyed every year and this, over 30 years, would amount to an area about the size of India. Apart from the direct and often dramatic impacts within the immediate area, nearby regions are affected by the spreading of sands or by changes in water regimes and increased risks of soil erosion and siltation. -Michael Allaby ( Thinking Green 1989)

16

17

A Paradigm Shift in Food Production: New Technologies, Experiments, and Theoretical Futures
Cabin ecology, as Peder Anker refers to it, is the preoccupation for designing as if each patron were an astronaut setting out for space. It evokes the need for complete self stainability and independence from outside resources. The following examples range in scope and scale. Some are built some remain theoretical. Each one represents an attempt at creating a more responsible relationship between people and the earth through the medium of food.

18

19

Chicago
With an estimated 80,000 vacant city lots in Chicago, mostly in economically under-developed neighborhoods, turning vacant land into an asset for the community is the primary objective of City Farm. The farm itself is a moveable feast: the land can be farmed, then the compost moved and reused elsewhere as lots become developed and communities grow. In addition to simply creating more green space and beautifying the urban landscape, the City Farm project hopes to provide education in organic farming and job creation for the community on the sites themselves, building a community-sustained operation while also providing highly nutritious products to people in under served neighborhoods. City Farms future goal is the creation of a demonstration garden for school children. In this setting, students would learn how to grow, harvest, and prepare nutritious seasonal produce, which could be integrated into their curriculum and revitalize school lunch programs. Students learn patience and discipline, and experience first hand the connection between what they eat and where it originates. Source: www.resourcecenterchicago.org

New York
In 1973 a local resident named Liz Christy and a group of gardening activists known as the Green Guerillas were planting window boxes, vacant lots with seed bombs and tree pits in the area. They saw the large rubble-strewn lot as a potential garden and in December went to the City to find a way to gain official use of the land. Volunteers hauled the garbage and rubble out, spread donated topsoil, installed a fence and began planting. On April 23, 1974, the Citys office of Housing Preservation and Development approved the site for rental as the Bowery Houston Community Farm and Garden for $1 a month. Sixty raised beds were planted with vegetables, and then trees and herbaceous borders were added. In their second year this forerunner of todays urban community gardens won its first Mollie Parnis Dress Up Your Neighborhood Award. People from other neighborhoods in all five boroughs saw what could be done and wanted information on how to start similar projects. Soon the Green Guerillas were running workshops and planting experimental plots to learn how a wide range of plants could be grown in hostile conditions. The garden became a site for many plant giveaways, where plants grown on-site or donated from nurseries, professional horticulturists and local gardeners were given to new gardens all over the City. In 1986 the Garden was dedicated Liz Christys Bowery-Houston Garden, in memory of its founder. In 1990, after years of uncertainty and a ground swell of support, the local development group, the Cooper Square Committee, pledged to preserve the garden in its entirety in its renovation plans for our neighborhood. The 2002 agreement between the City of New York and the NYS Attorney General calls for the preservation of the Liz Christy Garden. Source: http://www.lizchristygarden.org/

Cuba
With the collapse of the Soviet Bloc and its economic support in 1989 as well as the tightening up of the US economic embargo, Cuba suddenly plunged into its worst economic crisis since the 1959 Revolution. Officially dubbed the Special Period in Time of Peace, the ongoing economic crisis has had a devastating impact on Cuban food security. Cuban agriculture, which was highly dependent on chemical inputs from the Soviet Union, suddenly confronted a reduction of over 50% in oil, fertilizer, and pesticide imports. Meanwhile, food imports also dropped off as Cubas total import bill shrank by up to 70% between 1989 and 1993. As Fidel Castro himself stated in 1991: The food question has the number one priority. The effects of the Special Period and consequent food shortages have had greatest repercussions in the city of Havana. With approximately 2.5 million people, Havana has about one fifth of Cubas total population and is the largest city in the Caribbean. In addition to the decline in food production needed to serve the capital, there is also a shortage of petroleum necessary to transport, refrigerate, and store food available from the rural agricultural sector. Thus, it is no surprise that Havana has been designated as a priority in the National Food Program; urban gardening has figured critically among the many measures taken to enhance food security. While Havanas urban agriculture has taken on many forms, ranging from private gardens (huertos privados) to stateowned research gardens (organicponicos), Havanas popular gardens (huertos populares) are the most widespread and accessible to the general public. Popular gardens are small parcels of state-owned land that are cultivated by individuals or community groups in response to ongoing food shortages. The program for popular gardens first began in Havana in January 1991, and has since been promoted in other Cuban cities. In 1995, there were an estimated 26,600 popular garden parcels (parcelas) throughout the 43 urban districts that make up Havanas 15 municipalities. Source: Scott G. Chaplowe, World Sustainable Agriculture Association Fall 1996, Vol. 5, No. 22

Detroit
The Garden Resource Program is an effort to provide hundreds of home, school and community gardens access to resources and information in order to empower Detroit residents to grow, harvest, prepare, and preserve food for their families in their backyards and neighborhoods. Participants in the program receive basic resources for their garden, including seeds and Detroit grown transplants. Participants also become part of a growing network of community, school and family gardeners and garden advocates working to promote and encourage urban agriculture and community gardening across the city. Through participation in this larger network, gardeners gain access to additional resources, technical assistance, and educational opportunities. Source:http://www.detroitagriculture.org/garden_resource_program.htm

20

21

A Simple Solution
By Miranda Smith ORGANIC HYDROPONICS : From Self-Reliance by permission of the Institute for Local SelfReliance, 1717 18th Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20009. To many, the idea of organic hydroponics seems like an impossible contradiction. Hydroponics, the growing of plants in a medium other than soil, usually utilizes a chemically derived nutrient solution. Organic gardeners, as a rule, do no like hydroponics: for those who love the soil, the prospect of plunging elbow-deep into a gritty mix of parlite and vermiculite is not very inspiring. Nor is brewing up a batch of Hy-pon-ex or Miracle-gro. How-ever, as an enterprising group of urban gardeners in Montreal has discovered hydroponic food production need not rely upon a chemical nutrient solution ... and, under the unique conditions of rooftop farming in the city, soilless vegetable cultivation has distinct advantages. THE MONTREAL PROJECT Two years ago, the Canadian government funded an eighteen-month demonstration project in Montreal to investigate the feasibility of rooftop agriculture. The intent of the funding was the development of appropriate agricultural methods and technology so that people would be able to farm the flat wasteland above their city. The target community was the inner-city, ethnically mixed neighborhood, St. Louis Sud. Project workers taught courses in gardening and roof maintenance skills, so that community residents could take over the project when funding ran out. The two gardeners who were hired to teach, research, and supervise were experienced organic gardeners who preferred to work with soil. During the first summer, the rooftop gardens were planted in earth. Over 100 cubic yards of dirt had to be carried by hand up two flights of stairs, each cubic yard weighing between 195 and 270 pounds. The 22

NASA CELSS program

Closed Ecological Life Support Systems (CELSS)
Nasa developed technologies along side the Space Program to sustain life over extended periods of time away from earth. Experiments depend on complete isolation from outside influences. First studies into CELSS took place in the Soviet Union- under Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and V.I. Vernadsky. In 1984, NASA senior research scientist Dr. Bill Wolverton established the BioHome (completed in 1989). Squash, corn, sorghum, tomatoes and other organic crops were grown in the hydroponic sections of the BioHome. Non-edible plants, which were an essential part of the air purification process, filtered wastewater to be used as a growth medium.

23

soil then had to be loaded into carefully positioned containers, so that the stress on the roof would be minimized. Even though the roof was strong and could support 80 pounds per square foot, still much of the wasteland had to remain uncultivated. If a lighter medium had been used, more rooftop space could have been utilized for food production. During that first summer, the differences between ground level and rooftop agriculture became apparent. Container soil dried rapidly and had to be watered daily. Nutrients leached out with every rain and the plants had to be side-dressed with a variety of fertilizers at least every three weeks. Since the relative populations of soil micro-organisms and animals are greatly reduced in rooftop containers, their role in soil regeneration in the rooftop project was less significant. Earth worms, though they lived well in the boxes, could not bring minerals back into the earth from the parent rock because there were no parent rocks. By July, the root systems had become potbound, filling the entire container. It was found that insect problems occurred more easily on the roots than on the ground it strict care was not maintained. It began to look as if organic container gardening could never be more than a poor cousin to ground level organics. The project workers, however, came up with a solution, a method which could minimize the many logistical and ecological problems that were being encountered. That method was hydroponics and, given their organic gardening background, the workers decided to experiment with organic hydroponics. THE ORGANIC HYDROPONIC PROCEDURE Contrary to prevalent thought, it is extremely simple to mix a batch of organic nutrients adequate for the needs of any plant. One can either use a tea made from high quality compost, or a basic solution of 1-1/2 teaspoons fish emulsion, 1-1/2 teaspoons liquid seaweed, and a teaspoon of bloodmeal to each gallon of water. The mix varies, depending upon the type of plant being grown. Less bloodmeal should be used with flowering and fruiting produce than with leafy crops. Other nutrients can also be added: blended eggshells, for example, might be helpful when added to a cabbage crop. There is room for variation and for 24

Design by Blake Kurasek

25

more experimentation ... the basic mix is meant to be a starting point rather than a proven end product. The fish emulsion, seaweed, and bloodmeal recipe was developed in trials on lettuce during the Montreal winter. By spring, two successful lettuce crops had been harvested, so the project workers decided to try the nutrient solution with a tomato crop. Two large five- by sevenfoot cold frame boxes were prepared. One was fitted with hydroponic accessories and filled with a growing medium of hall perlite (a lava product) and half vermiculite (made from mica) to which fifty pounds of sand were added. This was found, after much experimentation, to be the best medium. The other box was provided with the normal drainage holes, filled with the conventional soil mix, and fertilized on regular schedule. For the first month of the summer, the thirty-six tomato plants being grown hydroponically lagged behind the thirty-six soil-grown tomatoes. This was because no seedling tomatoes had been started in a soilless mix and It was necessary to take the plants from the soil, wash the earth off their roots, and then set them in the hydroponic box. By July, the hydroponically grown tomatoes were larger, more sturdy, and had more fruit set than the soil-grown controls. They also had a much greater resistance to the aphids which infested downtown Montreal last summer. This increased resistance is a good indication that the plants were receiving excellent nutrition from the organic mix. Comparisons of the final yields are not yet available, but by midAugust the hydroponic tomato plants were producing about a third more tomatoes than the soil-grown controls. There is no doubt that this simple nutrient solution provides excellent nourishment. Critics of hydroponics claim that the method is too expensive and too complex. They also claim that it takes the fun out of gardening and is unaesthetic. The latter claim has some validity. Some community residents in Montreal were put off by the boxes of sterile, almost feathery growing medium. Many stressed that they were gardening for more than the potential vegetable yield, that they enjoyed working with dirt and compost. They wanted to learn about earth and they 26 The Science Barge is a prototype, sustainable urban farm and environmental education center. It is the only fully functioning demonstration of renewable energy supporting sustainable food production in New York City. The Science Barge grows tomatoes, cucumbers, and lettuce with zero net carbon emissions, zero chemical pesticides, and zero runoff. From May to October 2007, the Science Barge hosted over 3,000 schoolchildren from all five New York boroughs as well as surrounding counties as part of our environmental education program. In addition, over 6,000 adult visitors visited the facility along with press from around the world.

The Science Barge is not only an invitation to ideas and learning, but to change. Dr. Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and special economic advisor to the United Nations

Designed by New York Sun Works 27

were quite willing to make do with the Intensified problems of container soil for the chance to work with that medium. For people concerned with the economics and yields of urban food production, though, hydroponics makes a great deal of sense. Though soil is cheaper to buy than perlite and vermiculite, the labor costs for the Montreal group in carting 100 cubic yards of earth to the roof were significant. These costs were slashed with the switch to the hydroponic medium which weighed only two percent the weight of dirt. Further, since container soil does leach so readily and does require repeated fertilization, the actual cost of fertilizer for container plants grown in soil is comparable to the cost for hydroponic nutrients. Two more considerations must be mentioned. First, since the hydroponic medium is so much lighter than dirt, a much larger surface area of the roof can be covered with containers without the fear of structural collapse. Also, since hydroponic roots do not need to grow as far In search of nourishment as do the roots of plants grown in soil, planting densities can be more intensive and higher yields can be achieved. In terms of complexity, hydroponic food production requires neither sophisticated equipment nor supervision. The technology is simple and easy to construct. The container must be slightly elevated at one end and have drainage holes at the opposite end. One-inch polyvinyl chloride pipes with holes drilled every three inches are laid about an inch under the medium and raised at both ends of the box. Smaller rubber hoses from the nutrient supply are inserted into the pipe at one end and the upward bend in the pipe at the other end stops the flow of the solution. A gravity system for controlling nutrient flow, composed of two five-gallon buckets elevated on boxes and standing two feet above the top of the growing container makes care for the hydroponic vegetables simple. The nutrients can be mixed directly into the water in the buckets and filling the buckets and adding the nutrients takes approximately five minutes of work each day. The hydroponic medium holds water so effectively that rare is further simplify led: it is quite possible to skip a feeding for a day or two without causing any damage to the plants. Designs by Terreform studio 28 29

The experiments conducted in Montreal are important ones: the potential of organic hydroponics for producing both high yields and healthy produce on the rooftops of urban homes and businesses is significant. That the project was conducted in a low-income area and that the community residents have indeed taken over the garden project is also encouraging. Further work remains to be done: we hope to continue researching the methods and techniques of organic hydroponics in our newly completed rooftop greenhouse at the Institute for Local Self Reliance in Washington, D.C. And we hope that more community groups try their luck with organic hydroponics ... in Montreal, some people grew to love it. WHAT IS HYDROPONICS? Hydroponics is the cultivation of plants in a medium other than soil. When you start an avocado pit or root a plant cutting in a glass of water, you are practicing the simplest form of hydroponic culture. As the technique is more commonly used, plants are grown in a bed of material such as gravel, sand, or even sawdust. At ILSR, we use a mix of perlite and vermiculite, the one a lava product and the other a kind of puffed mica. The soilless growing material provides the physical support which the root system needs. A nutrient solution is fed into the mix periodically so that the roots can absorb all the nutrients which they would normally extract from soil. Article from Mother Earth News

The Pyramid Farm

30

Designs by Eric Ellingsen & Dickson Despommier

31

Agro-Housing
This apartment high-rise concept won a sustainable housing award recently in China. It integrates a vertical greenhouse into the high-rise. Designed by Knafo Klimor Architects, the agro-housing concept allows the residents to produce their own food, reducing commuting needs and providing a green neighborhood. The greenhouse is a multi-floor structure for cultivation of crops such as vegetables, fruits, flowers and spices, equipped with a drip irrigation system that re-uses grey water. The greenhouse climate is controlled through natural ventilation and a heating system. A roof-top terrace garden offers open-air green space for recreation and informal gathering. A sky club on the roof is designed to host social gatherings and celebrations, and a kindergarten on the ground floor keeps young children close to home and family. The individual apartments allow maximum flexibility to arrange interior spaces to accommodate family changes over time, including integration of a work space. The building has a minimal footprint in order to free the ground surface for gardening and rainwater harvesting. Paving is limited and made of recycled materials.

Vertically Integrated Greenhouse The Vertically Integrated Greenhouse (VIG) combines a double-skin building facade with a hydroponic greenhouse, offering one pathway towards energy efficient cities that can grow their own food. The concept was jointly developed by New York Sun Works, Kiss + Cathcart, and Arup New York. The Vertically Integrated Greenhouse (VIG) is a highly productive, lightweight, modular, climatically responsive system for growing vegetables within a double skin facade (DSF). The system is achievable with extant technology. A south facing, vertical glazed facade at the relatively high latitude of the UK admits a fairly even distribution of sunlight throughout the year. Compared to a conventional greenhouse, the VIG provides increased production in winter, when produce prices peak. Plants are grown on trays suspended by a simple cable system, and all crop management occurs at the bottom level. Systems modules can rise as high as 10 or 20 stories each. An adaptive control system alters the angles between rows of plants in the manner of Venetian blind, maximizing solar absorption diurnally and seasonally. Research on existing buildings in Europe indicates that a DSF adds approximately 5% to the cost of a new high rise; the additional components to make the DSF into a VIG add only slightly to this cost. Greenhouse crops add a significant financial return to the base case for a DSF, which centers on enhanced winter heat gain and noise control. The crops also shade the interior. Other studies indicate that a green work environment raises productivity by 1.0 to 1.5%, representing a net present value in the U.S. of $400 to $600 per m2 of floor area. Design by New York Sun Works Studio 32

Design by Knafo Klimor Architects 33

Farmadelphia

Designs by Front Studio 34 35

The Living Tower

36

Designs by Pierre Sartoux and atelier SOA architects

37

Wealth is our organized capability to cope effectively with and decreasing both the physical and metaphysical

the environment in sustaining our healthy regeneration restrictions of the forward days of our lives. -Richard Buckminster-Fuller 1969

38

39