Beehives, Ladybugs, and Eyes – Say what?
This week the greenhouse group has focused on brainstorming a series of radical and creative designs. Which includes greenhouses shaped as domes, leaves, and other biological based designs (eyes, beehive, ladybug, etc.). We have added them to our growing archive and in Tuesdays class, created a mind-map of everything a sustainable greenhouse could entail. We have discussed how the greenhouse will function, such as heating systems, water supply and power supply. Some ideas include using solar panels to heat the water that may circulate through the greenhouse and heat the roots (root zone heating). Other ideas include implementing an underground heat sink, which will control the temperature in the greenhouse either by using water or recycled materials. In terms of irrigation, rainwater run-off from the eco-house and greenhouse can be collected and distributed to the plants. The picture included is a design proposal for our greenhouse by a group member that takes a Canadian bio-architecture approach for an interesting, unique greenhouse. For next week we plan to focus on selecting three or so baseline designs and detailing a list of contents that will be included in the greenhouse, as well as focusing on what sources of power and heating we are going to include.
