You can already sense that this is a very different approach than the heat-, beat- and treatmethod we all know and is eagerly being used by the industry. In nature, things are being created in water, without any waste, and the only energy source being used is the sun. Can we produce in the same way? To find out we have to start by looking at nature, finding out how nature solves similar problems. When we have found these solution, the real challenge starts. How to apply these principles to your own design? Let me give you a little example:
Our design aim is to create a self-providing and self-organizing grid by which a city is being fed by using one – rather big – allotment. One of the problems we have to face is delivering the food on time, before it goes bad. Using Ask Nature we found a few examples in nature who have to deal with the same problem.
Let’s start with the ants. They created a storage system in which food from different sources is being mixed. By doing this, you would only eat a little bit of the bad source and a lot of the good sources.
Snakes deal very differently with the same problem. They conserve their food by using ‘just-in-time manufacturing’ by only producing the toxic chemicals when needed.
So far for the ‘getting inspired by nature’. The next step is to apply these examples to our design.. I’m curious where this will take us!
