This Is What New York Would Look Like If The Whole City Was A Giant Urban Farm

The Big Apple would be a lot greener if it needed to grow its own food.

For the past six years, the urban research nonprofit Terreform has carefully considered exactly what New York City would look like if everything New Yorkers ate was grown inside city limits.

“At some level, it’s absurd,” says Michael Sorkin, who leads Terreform.

“We discovered that with intense use of vertical agriculture and a change in diet, we could in fact physically provide the facilities to grow 2500 decent calories for every resident in New York."

"But the energy estimates were so enormous we estimated that 25 nuclear power plants would be required.”

 

Still, even if cities don’t necessarily become giant farms, the research can help point urban areas toward more sustainable choices.

 

The researchers also looked at options for growing all food within 100 miles of the city, or growing everything within the state.

“We looked at 100% autonomy-- what effort that would take, what forms, what living arrangements-- and we then look for some more reasonable response,” Sorkin says.

The research is part of a larger project called New York City (Steady) State, which will eventually detail how the city can be entirely self-sufficient, from energy to waste.

It’s intended as a counterpoint to things like ecological footprints, which generically measure environmental impact.

Here, the researchers are looking at specific and direct impacts in a confined area.

"It’s a matter of taking responsibility for one’s effects on the planet," Sorkin says.

"New York is a good place to start because New Yorkers, as Americans, are enormous consumers."

The design includes everything from a skyscraper devoted to meat production (though Sorkin notes that it would be a lot easier, sustainability-wise, if everyone in the city became vegan), to rooftop "neighborhood food hubs" and streets that are turned into gardens.

"We’re looking at all sorts of resources that we think are misused in New York, like streets," he explains.

 

"This is the largest area of space in the public realm. Imagine if we took half of the street out of the automobile realm and put it in the pedestrian realm: There could be farms, there could be daycare centers, there could be all sorts of public amenities."

They found a few limits for food production; coffee, for example, is hard to grow in a vertical farm. Even in that case, they tried to find a local connection.

After learning that Haiti grows enough coffee to supply half of New York's needs, they've proposed an agreement between the two locations.

Haitians could be given education at schools like Columbia in exchange for selling New Yorkers coffee.

 

After Terreform completes research on other aspects of self-sufficiency, like energy, it will be putting together a resource for cities to use in planning.

"We're compiling an encyclopedia of the technologies and morphologies that could be used for cities around the world that are interested in moving in the direction of autonomy," Sorkin says.

And they continue to push the boundaries of what self-sufficiency can mean.

"We're always asking a question about the nature of the membrane around the city," Sorkin says.

"What would it be permeable to, what protections would have to be given to local production. It's an armature for speculation."

The Big Apple would be a lot greener if it needed to grow its own food.

The New York City (Steady) State is considering what it would mean if the city's 8 million residents were entirely self-sufficient, from the food they eat to the fuel they burn.
 
For the past six years, the urban research nonprofit Terreform has carefully considered exactly what New York City would look like if everything New Yorkers ate was grown inside city limits.

“At some level, it’s absurd,” says Michael Sorkin, who leads Terreform. “We discovered that with intense use of vertical agriculture and a change in diet, we could in fact physically provide the facilities to grow 2,500 decent calories for every resident in New York. But the energy estimates were so enormous we estimated that 25 nuclear power plants would be required.”

Amsterdam Ave.

Still, even if cities don’t necessarily become giant farms, the research can help point urban areas toward more sustainable choices. The researchers also looked at options for growing all food within 100 miles of the city, or growing everything within the state. “We looked at 100% autonomy--what effort that would take, what forms, what living arrangements--and we then look for some more reasonable response,” Sorkin says.

The research is part of a larger project called New York City (Steady) State, which will eventually detail how the city can be entirely self-sufficient, from energy to waste. It’s intended as a counterpoint to things like ecological footprints, which generically measure environmental impact.

Here, the researchers are looking at specific and direct impacts in a confined area.

"It’s a matter of taking responsibility for one’s effects on the planet," Sorkin says. "New York is a good place to start because New Yorkers, as Americans, are enormous consumers."

Why look at consumption on the level of the city? "Nation-states seem to be incompetent, and multi-nationals seem to be badly motivated," he says. "As an urbanist, I wanted to know what a city could actually accomplish if it decided to truly take responsibility."

Sunnyside, Queens site

The design includes everything from a skyscraper devoted to meat production (though Sorkin notes that it would be a lot easier, sustainability-wise, if everyone in the city became vegan), to rooftop "neighborhood food hubs" and streets that are turned into gardens.

"We’re looking at all sorts of resources that we think are misused in New York, like streets," he explains. "This is the largest area of space in the public realm. Imagine if we took half of the street out of the automobile realm and put it in the pedestrian realm: There could be farms, there could be daycare centers, there could be all sorts of public amenities."

They found a few limits for food production; coffee, for example, is hard to grow in a vertical farm. Even in that case, they tried to find a local connection. After learning that Haiti grows enough coffee to supply half of New York's needs, they've proposed an agreement between the two locations: Haitians could be given education at schools like Columbia in exchange for selling New Yorkers coffee. 

After Terreform completes research on other aspects of self-sufficiency, like energy, it will be putting together a resource for cities to use in planning. "We're compiling an encyclopedia of the technologies and morphologies that could be used for cities around the world that are interested in moving in the direction of autonomy," Sorkin says.

And they continue to push the boundaries of what self-sufficiency can mean. "We're always asking a question about the nature of the membrane around the city," Sorkin says. "What would it be permeable to, what protections would have to be given to local production. It's an armature for speculation."

ORIGINAL: Fast Company

6 Amazing Inventions Made Possible by Nanotechnology

ORIGINAL: MyLifeScoop

By Rebecca Paul (from Inhabitat) on March 21, 2012

Nanotechology has evolved by leaps and bounds over the past few years, and we've seen scores of big developments made possible by designs smaller than the eye can see. To get you up to speed on the latest and greatest in nano-scale technology, we've put together a mind-bending list of six of our favorite inventions - from water purifying tea bags to self-heating roads and clothing that cleans the air you breathe!

Nanotech Water Purifying Tea Bag

Millions of people around the world have limited access to drinking water - and diseases caused by contaminated water sources kill 1.8 million people each year. As both private and public entities continue to look for viable solutions to the problem, one promising development comes to us from South Africa, where researchers have used nanotechnology to create a water-purifying tea bag that costs just half a cent. In order to activate the tea bag, the user places it into the neck of a water bottle and then drinks water that passes through it. The design is portable and instantly effective! However, none of this would be possible without the help of nanotechnology - researchers have combined ultra-thin, nano-scale fibers with grains of activated carbon to filter harmful contaminants and kill bacteria.

Artificial Muscles to Propel Nanobots Through the Body

Nanotechnology has already had a significant impact on the world of medical science - however the next generation of nano-scale medical technology will blow your mind. For example, researchers from the University of British Columbia are currently working on a line of nanobots that will aim to diagnose and heal the body from the inside. In order to accomplish this amazing feat they have developed artificial muscles that are extremely flexible and strong enough to rotate objects a thousand times their own weight. By spinning carbon nanotubes into helical yarns, researchers were able to control the yarn with an electrochemical charge that causes them to twist and untwist. The muscle can be incorporated into bots with artificial flagella, or tiny tails that would rotate to propel them.

Self-Heating Roads Save Cars From Icy Conditions

When it comes unpredictable winter weather, maintaining safe driving conditions is a major concern. Luckily, over the past few years researchers at the University of Houston have made some great strides in turning the threat of icy roads into a worry of the past. Their self-heating roads are embedded with sheets of carbon nanofiber that are warmed by an electrical element. It only takes two hours and 6 watts of power to take a block of concrete from -10 to 0 C. We probably won't see streets across the states upgraded with the technology come December, but areas known for having dangerously icy conditions could be prime candidates for the first installations. 

Nanotechnology Makes Poop Power 20 Times More Efficient

As researchers continue to explore new ways to harness renewable energy from the wind, sun and waves, many people overlook another renewable resource -- the one we flush down our toilets. That's right, with a little help from fuel cells, engineers at Oregon State University are taking poop and turning it into clean, green electricity. These mad scientists discovered that by applying a nanoparticle coating to the anodes inside the fuel cells, they were able to increase the cell's energy production by a staggering 20 times. The energy produced could potentially power future waste management systems and alleviate their energy expense.

Catalytic Clothing Cleans the Air You Breathe

Fashion finds a new purpose with Catalytic Clothing's amazing pollution neutralizing textiles. Their innovative fabrics are designed to act as catalytic surfaces capable of scrubbing the air of nitrogen oxides and the volatile organic compounds that are emitted by factories and gas-guzzling modes of transportation. To create these air-purifying textiles, raw titanium dioxide is washed into clothing as an additive in a detergent. Once the fabric has dried, the garment is activated and the resulting titanium dioxide nanorods begin to attract and neutralize polluting particles that touch them. Catalytic Clothing's venture is simple, efficient, and it has the potential to turn all of us into walking air-filters.

Tube Shape Photovoltaic Cells Could Result in Solar Powered Clothing 

Today's solar-powered clothing sadly lacks fashion sense - garments typically consist of a solar panel strapped to a backpack or shirt. But this could soon change, as a team of researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Xiamen University have developed a flexible tube-like photovoltaic cell that can be woven discretely in to fabric. The technology uses semi-conducting nanorods made from carbon fibers and titania that look similar to the bristles on a hairbrush. The industrial process to create the fabric is rather laborious and time-consuming, but these nanorods can be applied to photocatalysts to generate energy from the sun. The technology is still in its early stages, but we hope to see more breakthroughs on the horizon.

Colombia, bajo un invierno anunciado

ORIGINAL: ElColombiano

Juliana Eusse Guerra- Mariana Ramírez Vidal | Medellín | Publicado el 27 de noviembre de 2011

EL PAÍS NO ha tenido la capacidad para enfrentar el duro Fenómeno de la Niña de 2010 y ya padece el segundo.

Colprensa | Los cierres por deslizamientos en la vía La Línea
 le han dejado al país pérdidas por 200.000 millones de pesos.

Hoy 104 familias lloran la ausencia de un ser querido que perdió la vida a causa de una avalancha, una inundación, un deslizamiento, una tormenta eléctrica... o cualquier otro fenómeno relacionado con las lluvias que no cesan en el país.

El Instituto de Hidrología, Meteorología y Estudios Ambientales de Colombia (Ideam), pronostica que para el próximo 15 de diciembre las nubes podrían estar dejando de cubrir los cielos de Colombia, pero mientras tanto, las carreteras colapsan, las montañas se desprenden, los ríos se desbordan y los colombianos siguen padeciendo las inclemencias del Fenómeno de la Niña.

¿Qué pasa con la atención?

Al parecer falta coordinación entre las entidades encargadas de atender la ola invernal, que llegó al país cuando a penas comenzaban a ejecutarse las obras de reconstrucción en infraestructura destruidas por la primera ola invernal de finales de 2010 y principios de 2011.

Colombia Humanitaria, entidad encargada de atender en asistencia humanitaria y rehabilitación del Fenómeno de la Niña que se presentó en 2010, indicó que el 94 por ciento de las tareas están en ejecución en los municipios afectados.

Sin embargo, en una discusión que se llevó a cabo el pasado martes en el Congreso, el senador Antonio Guerra de la Espriella afirmó que las cuentas en la atención a la emergencia invernal, no coinciden y pidió claridad al Gobierno.

Además, el Senador señaló que 27 localidades reportaron excesiva tramitología en la contratación, a pesar que los recursos no están sujetos al régimen de contratación pública. Así mismo, dijo que 64 denuncian, además de la tramitología, demoras injustificadas en el giro de los recursos.

Frente a este tema particular, Colombia Humanitaria aseguró que los inconvenientes que se han presentado se deben a varias razones, entre ellas a que la atención ha sido directamente proporcional a la tragedia y que la avalancha de solicitudes también desbordó la capacidad de la Fiduprevisora, que ante las denuncias permanentes de los alcaldes porque no se hacían a tiempo los desembolsos, tuvo que adelantar un plan de choque apoyado por Colombia Humanitaria.

En el mismo debate, el Gerente del Fondo Nacional de Calamidades de Colombia Humanitaria, Everardo Murillo, denunció que hay irregularidades en 74 obras por 14 mil millones de pesos. "De eso deberán dar cuenta alcaldes y Gobernadores", dijo.

Al respecto, la Contraloría de la República, afirmó que han recibido dos mil denuncias en todo el país sobre malos manejos de los recursos destinados a atender la ola invernal. Por su parte la Procuraduría Nacional aseguró que se adelantan cerca de 370 investigaciones a funcionarios públicos en el mismo sentido, de las cuales 80 corresponden a la presente temporada de lluvias.

Mientras las entidades se debaten entre quién y cómo se ha fallado en la atención a la presente ola invernal, el país la padece.

Hoy están en alerta roja los ríos Magdalena, Bogotá, Cauca y Atrato. 371.883 personas se han visto afectadas por las lluvias y 65.206 viviendas han resultado averiadas y 495 destruidas.

Caldas, Antioquia y Quindío están en amenaza alta de deslizamiento en áreas inestables y, solo los cierres de esta semana en una de las principales arterias del país, La Línea, ha dejado pérdidas por más de 200.000 millones de pesos.

A pesar de lo anterior, el presidente Juan Manuel Santos dice que no decretará aún emergencia nacional.

La Sabana de Bogotá es una de las zonas del país más afectadas por la segunda ola invernal.