BuildingGreen.com has a great
article by Alex Wilson about passive survivability for designing buildings that can act as shelters during future emergencies (blizzards, hurricanes, heat waves, terrorist attacks, riots) even with the loss of electricity, water or fuel. It's a great article and reading the entire thing is a great idea. I'll dissect it more below the flip.
In preparing for a series of charrettes on Gulf Coast reconstruction for the Greenbuild conference in November 2005, the term passive survivability emerged as an umbrella concept to convey the idea of buildings that maintain livable conditions in the event of extended power outages, interruptions of fuel supply, or loss of water and sewer services.
As someone with a degree in mechanical engineering pursuing a graduate degree in environmental engineering I found this to be a really interesting concept. Passive controls are always the best controls. The are reliable and usually cheaper, but they take a lot of ingenuity to design and implement. Clearly this needs to be taken into consideration when designing structures that are to be used when people are at their most vulnerable.
As an engineer I love looking at design issues. I agree with Wally from Dilbert that Every problem has an engineering solution. I really like the more exotic examples they looked at.
The house designs of some animals display even better examples of passive survivability. Among the best are termite mounds of Africa and Australia (see photo). "With a single ganglion for a brain, using no electricity or fossil fuels, termites construct dwellings that maintain temperature, humidity, and ventilation better than most buildings," says Brennan.
I'm not sure what useful information they can really get for termite mounds, but it's remarkable to think about how simple it should be to make building livable without modern luxuries. Ants also dig out perfect homes in the dark without any plans at all. It's a humbling thought that such seemingly simple creatures are much better at surviving than we are.
I also really like the idea of passive survivability because it recognizes the consequences of climate change. But, these design principles are useful without catastrophic climate change. They are useful in any area that may experience extreme heat or cold, or power loss, or water supply issues, fuel shortages or terrorsit attacks. So, pretty much the entire planet. These principles are also useful during day-to-day operations because building maintenance should be cheaper when such issues are considered in the design phase. These buildings should also require less energy and would hopefully have on-site renewable energy sources (PV arrays, or wind turbines).
Passive survivability is a responsible design strategy that should be pursued in all future construction of buildings needed during emergencies. These ideas should also be incorporated into standard building design practices because they make buildings safer, more comfortable, and cheaper to operate. I'm really excited about following this more. Post any links that you might have on this.