A MESSAGE OF HOPE
This is our original editorial, launched with our
first issue:
Editorial, V1, #1, January 2002
Welcome to the new millennium. Welcome, also, to ECOTECTURE: The
Online Journal of Ecological Design, and its message for the future.
Ours is a message of hope: The hope that, through redesigning our
homes and cities, and our agricultural, transportation, production,
and economic systems-and, most importantly, reconnecting spiritually
with the earth-we can save the planet and ourselves from impending
ecological doom.
It is our belief that humans are neither stupid nor evil, but that,
mostly through historical accident, we have designed stupid and
evil systems. The good news is, we can design new systems. Our systems
are not "us" any more than a hammer is a hand-they are
extension of ourselves, expressions of who we are and who we want
to be. Just as we are free to put down a hammer and pick up a saw,
we are free to change the systems that we have allowed to rule us
and are destroying the planet.
The most significant results of our poorly designed economic, social,
and physical support systems are global warming, mass extinction,
deforestation, pollution and over consumption in the most developed
countries-closely followed by overpopulation in the less developed
countries. What is often overlooked, even in environmental publications,
is that these conditions exacerbate each other. The real danger
is that some of these conditions will enter into unpredictable synergetic
relationships with one another which can create feedback loops that
will accelerate environmental damage past the point of no return.
The diminishment of the so called albedo effect provides a simple
example of a feedback loop. Albedo is the capacity of a surface
to reflect radiation. In the case of incoming solar radiation, or
insolation, the albedo of snow and ice is high, whereas that of
water or dark soil is much lower.
The polar ice caps are beginning to melt as a result of global
warming.
As the water or, in the case of Antarctica, land beneath the edge
of the ice caps is exposed through melt off, the sun’s rays,
which would normally be largely reflected by the bright ice, are
increasingly absorbed by the darker surfaces. The more absorption,
the greater the temperature of the oceans, land, and, by conduction,
atmosphere, melting even more ice. Thus, lessening the earth’s
albedo potential increases global warming which, in turn, further
lessens the albedo potential by melting even more ice which, in
its turn, more rapidly increasing global warming which then melts
even more ice and so on in an accelerating feedback loop of vast
proportions.
The ice-melt/dark-surface-exposure feedback loop is just one of
hundreds that we are promulgating through our present, non-sustainable
practices. In a related condition, global warming is thawing the
permafrost tundra in arctic regions around the globe. Millions of
millions of metric tons of methane gas trapped in the permafrost
will be released into the atmosphere by the thawing. Methane is
one of the most potent greenhouse gasses, so the more of it we cause
to be released, the faster global warming will progress, and the
faster the permafrost will melt . . .
Naturally, global warming is related to the despeciation (loss
of biodiversity), and despeciation, especially deforestation, is
related to many of the root causes of global warming. The point
is, we are like children playing with matches in a basement full
of old newspapers. We have no idea when or how these global-scale
feedback loops might combine to create adverse conditions which
we simply will not have the knowhow or resources to correct.
A global environmental meltdown is not a scenario of the future,
but a reality of the present. We have already entered the era of
ecological and, by implication, social, economic and political disaster-ask
any of the one-and-a-half billion people planet wide who are currently
subsisting below the United Nations’ rather austere standards
for minimal life support.
The solutions, we at ECOTECTURE believe, are found in the emerging
field known broadly as ecological or sustainable design. We need
to re-design our habitation, transportation, and production systems
using natural ecosystems as a model. The operating principles of
ecosystems have sustained life on the planet for over three billion
years while what we are doing is clearly unsustainable. Our magazine
is about how designers all over the world are using the operating
principles of natural ecosystems to design and build human systems.
Our contention is that when a critical mass of such systems is conceived,
designed, and implemented, humanity as a whole will make a quantum
leap to new spiritual, economic, social, and fiscal order-a new
paradigm rooted in ecology. Our role at ECOTECTURE is to discover,
evaluate, organize and publish the information needed to create
that paradigm.
ECOTECTURE will focus on aspects of the ecological design field
such as the re-design of cities for better ecological performance,
sustainable agriculture, ecological housing, and alternative energy.
Our focus will be on solutions that are already in place on a small
scale, such as water recycling systems and intentional communities,
and new developments in the field such as hydrogen-fuel cells, geographic
information systems, and the internet. Whenever possible, we will
give our reports a human face by interviewing a leading ecological
designer. We will also sponsor a forum where our readers can share
ideas, designs, and the results of their experiments.
Foolishly optimistic or not, we believe that by following nature’s
practices we can still reverse the march toward destruction and
enter an era of harmonious relationship between humans and their
home planet. This theory is untested, and perhaps we are wrong.
Perhaps it is too late, or our ways are too entrenched, our will
too little. The only problem with such thinking is that it has never
been true before-humanity, as a whole, has responded positively
to every challenge it has encountered. That’s why we are still
here. Our belief is that humans are wonderful creatures, basically
benevolent and more than capable of designing and implementing ecologically
beneficial systems-systems that harmonize with nature and can sustain
a just and peaceful human society planet wide.
The creation of the new paradigm and the physical systems that
support it is a task for everyone from professional designers and
city planners to homeowners growing an organic garden. Also, every
bit of participation counts. Every word we speak and action we take
has a ripple effect, and we never know just how far across the vast
fielf of human consciousness the ripples travel.
We have therefore made it Ecotecture’s mission is to give
you the information you need to make the changes we all need. We
will succeed only to the extent that we can inform and inspire you.
The measure of our success will be the good use to which you put
the information we provide.
Philip S Wenz | Publisher/Editor
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