Takenouchi Manuscripts

Acknowledgments

Bibliography

Index

What I have Learned

Claudia van den Bergh, 12 September 2017

For The Global Playground

A research project for Project Design to educate everyone on how to design a facility with low ecological cost. The world is throwing waste everywhere it can be found and it's getting worse. Litter is an increasing amount of contamination by introducing new species, the problem just gets more expensive. To address this issue, the authors attempted to reduce the footprint of a building so it could become a beautiful site for people to come together and learn about sustainability. The goal was to give people the opportunities to share their ideas without the typical barriers that exist to doing so (like heavy lifting) or work with difficult conditions (shipping). Learning how to sustainably use your assets has always been my first love. There are less expensive solutions than buying $600,000 wind turbines every 10 weeks across the world. This is despite all our wealth.

Dr. Jean-Luc Métaize, 2010

The book has three parts: the first lays out exactly where resources are divided and why, the second discusses the concept of "ecological footprinting" and how it makes big differences in the way we interact with each other, and the third focuses on the idea of "ecofriendly" communities.

Read it

What are ecofriendly communities?

Author Alex Kreider, 2012

To understand the reality of ecological footprinting, it is useful to understand the idea of ecofriendliness. Ecoffriendliness is defined as allowing sustainable use of resources and limiting harm to ecosystem services and biodiversity. These principles are employed in environmental policy and are protected in government policy documents.

For example, during World War II when resources were rationed, a plant did not grow well over time if it was highly concentrated around a person. If you were hurt by something, you would be helped to recover.

Everyone is trying to meet their own standards and these are becoming stricter. In the US, this means citizens turning to alternative energy such as clean windmills instead of the dirty, polluting coal mines that have polluted the environment for so long.