What is an archibiotic? | Vincent Callebaut | TEDxNantes
Translator: Denise RQ Reviewer: Mary Kay Hello everyone. I am here today to introduce you to our architectural concept called Archibiotic. Indeed, biotic art is a new kind of transdiciplinary Eco-concept aiming to create new cities and intelligent buildings, that is, zero carbon emission buildings. They are self-sufficient in energy or even energy-positive that is, they produce more energy than they consume. These buildings also recycle all their waste following nature's cycles. Archibiotic wants to reinvent tomorrow's lifestyle in a transdisciplinary way by partly rejecting the anxiety-inducing situation in which we live today at the crossroads of major ecological and economic crises. Indeed, since childhood, I have always been inspired by the forms of nature, by ecosystems, when I walked through my grandparents' gardens, in agricultural fields or in forests, analyzing the different life forms. I incorporated this passion into my job, developing new organic architectures inspired particularly by biomorphism, bionics, and biomimicry. Indeed, thanks to biomorphism, today we are able to analyze life forms very accurately and incorporate them into our architecture. For example, analyzing the spiral shape of the nautilus, in a project in Morocco, allows us to build an aerodynamic architecture that has natural ventilation. In bionics, we no longer study the form, but we study the structures and materials of living things to incorporate them into our architecture. For example, we are inspired by dragonfly wings or water lily leaves that have significant structural capacities which can be transferred, thanks to our engineers, to some of our projects. Then we study biomimicry, which goes even further, studying large scale ecosystems, mature ecosystems, that is, those organisms in our biosphere that have learned to create interactions between themselves to transform waste and constraints into natural resources and opportunities. The city of tomorrow will be dense, green, and connected. Indeed, for a decade, I have been in favour of building green cities, fertile, sustaining cities, which can bring back to the city not only ecosystems and biodiversity following nature's cycles but also agriculture to reintegrate modes of food production in places of consumption. I am also in favour of a dense city because, as you know, the denser a city is, the less energy-intensive it is. We are therefore campaigning to limit horizontal sprawl as much as possible, which can currently be seen in most of our European cities. I am also in favour of ultra-connected cities, using the efficiency of information and communication technologies to completely streamline our modes of consumption, by dematerialization, and also by reducing land use, reducing systematic recourse to our means of transport, public or private. The first archibiotic I will present to you is our Lilypad project, which was initiated in 2008 due to the climate crisis, which has been highlighted by many international observers. We wanted to create a floating, mobile platform, an amphibious city, in total harmony with the marine environment. The city moves on the oceans, from the equator to the poles, and offers a new way of housing future climate refugees who will appear during the 21st century. Indeed, according to the scientific scene, we now know that an increase in global temperatures of one degree will increase the level of the oceans by one meter. This increase in the level of the oceans will make some areas disappear, such as 1% of Egypt, 7% of the Netherlands, 17% of Bangladesh, and up to 80% of the Maldives archipelago. So we wanted to create a possible alternative in advance for the 50 million climate refugees predicted for 2030. This figure will increase to 250 million by 2100. We therefore wanted to suggest to the municipality of Kiribati the creation of a city that is self-sufficient in energy, which is submerged as much above the water level as below the water level. We therefore suggested an amphibious model, integrating all renewable energies. This city is inspired by biomimicry of the structure of the Amazon waterlily's giant leaves Victoria regia, which has exceptional plasticity with its radial and concentric pattern of veins and makes for the most stable platform possible floating on the oceans. Our engineers transcribed this structure on to architectural and engineering plans to explore how a structure can withstand being driven by marine currents stabilized by a central ballast of fresh water, which is actually the rainwater recovered and phyto-purified by hanging gardens. The town is organized around three multi-functional mountains given over to trade, leisure and work, covered with hanging gardens and a network of streets, lanes, and passageways leading to housing that is completely covered with plants. Each apartment's balcony is a hanging orchard or kitchen garden which makes each inhabitant into an organic food farmer. This city is completely amphibious. We presented it especially in many nursery and primary schools, to educate the younger generation and our children, to increase awareness of urban ecology and thus we present positive answers saying that today it is possible to build sustainable cities. This project has also been suggested to the European Community to raise geopolitical and social awareness about how future environmental migrants can be housed whilst also granting them rights and obligations. This project has also been suggested to certain cities, such as Monaco or Hong Kong so they can extend their limited territory offshore. The second project is the Dragonfly project, a pioneering project focusing on the agriculture of the future. Indeed, in the near future, there will be 9 billion of us on Earth, and of these 9 billion human beings more than two thirds will live in cities. So today, it is essential to invent a new way of thinking about our modes of food production. While the intention is for rural agriculture to produce grain for food in developing and under-developed countries, it will also aim to create second generation bio-fuels, that is bio-fuels that are not made from the edible part of the plant, but from the waste. So local agriculture can be reinstated directly in the heart of cities in places of consumption: vertical farms that would create layers of agricultural fields. This vertical farms project is inspired by dragonflies' wings, which are finely veined, mimicking nature, because, in fact, nature always uses the minimum amount of materials to build the strongest possible structures. We have also retransposed this structure into our project, our plans, and our sections, to study bioclimatic organic architecture with our engineers. Actually, in summer we can naturally ventilate and cool this vertical farm and we can build up hot air from the winter sun so there is a buffer meaning the temperature is kept constant. The city of New York has large differences in temperature: between minus 25° in winter and 40° in summer. This city is completely organic, and so allows layering of agricultural fields with vertical farms where dairy products, meat, and eggs can be produced for a closed-loop city. Today's Western city is based on a loop that always imports raw materials and wealth, and which exports pollution and waste. We want to break this loop by using intelligent buildings that work in a closed environment managing to be self-sufficient in energy through the integration of renewable energies. This is the chance we have today: having self-sufficient buildings where, here, you see a vertical farm that has a photovoltaic shield producing 50% of the electrical energy needed for running this urban farm. The rest of the electricity is supplied by axial and vertical wind turbines integrated directly into the hull in line with the prevailing winds. With its architectural and mixed composition, we have suggested to investors building an office tower and a housing tower very close to large bioclimatic greenhouses. Using this multifunctional design, energy production can be reduced by 50% because in fact, for example, the heat emitted in offices in the daytime is retransmitted in the evening into homes. This greatly reduces energy consumption. What we wanted to do is create a veritable Central Park, turned vertically, which feeds the city's inhabitants. Here are a few views of the central marina, which accommodates bio-taxi moorings or floating markets, or floating markets, the surplus food produced by the vertical farm in the city of Manhattan. A few views of hanging greenhouses, and of bio-lofts, where, eventually, agriculture has spread across different floors: agricultural fields, community orchards, or individual hydroponic balconies. After considering floating cities and vertical farms, we wanted to explore a project in partnership with a U.S. oil group to produce third generation clean transport, which works in the same way as nature recycles its wastes, and transforms them into natural resources, we wanted to work using green algae produced by our intensive agriculture, which produces too many nitrates, found especially in our groundwater and near to beaches. By putting these green algae into cells in vitro, we use biochemistry to create accelerated photosynthesis, which is capable of degrading plastics found in the oceans and in all petroleum derivatives. So we wanted to create a marine farm that is a great purifier of the seas retrieving these plastics and breaking them down to form biogas. This biogas could be injected into vertical zeppelins that could serve areas affected by natural disasters or by health emergencies. These vertical zeppelins could also be used to send food and agricultural produce from Western countries to developing countries. We always wanted to create buildings that are actually living ecosystems, which interact with nature and recycle waste by transforming it into opportunities. The fourth project that I will present to you, the Coral Reef project, is a vertical ecovillage, which is currently in the city of Haiti's planning system. It is based on the standardization of a prefabricated module brought on a cargo ship, allowing construction within 6 months of 1,000 passive houses that do not need to be heated in winter or cooled in summer. It is a steel and wood construction covered with hanging gardens, in order to enhance the lives of its inhabitants, which is self-sufficient in energy. Most of these projects could seem utopian to you, but they are currently being explored in my agency, and now we are succeeding in obtaining international calls for tenders from China and the United Arab Emirates, and in South America, to construct these intelligent buildings that emit zero carbon, are self-sufficient in energy, and recycle their own waste. I invite you to visit our website www.Vincent.callebaut.org where we present a new project called Agora Garden, a residential towers contest we won in 2010, which is currently under construction. It has the peculiarity of being a residential building completely covered with hanging gardens, orchards and vegetable gardens in the heart of Taipei City at the foot of the 101 Tower. I thank you. (Applause)