Designing for people with special needs

Rock Village is a concept for mentally disabled people with special needs. The societal objectives of the project are reintegrating the end users to the society by offering them social integration opportunities, raising the public awareness of mentally disabled people, and focusing on empowerment and independence. As the Rock Village is a home for people with special needs, the socio-cultural aspects need to be taken into deep consideration during the planning and design phase. How should the the special needs be recognized in planning and design?

There are three important aspects in designing for the disabled: creating a stimulating environment, coherence and control. The environment should be stimulating, yet clear enough to avoid confusion. Planning and design can be assisted with the right use of for example colors, light, coding, floor patterns, materials and sensory cues. For coherence, the spaces and their uses need to be clearly distinguished. Offering a feeling of control through giving possibilities of altering the space is also important. There should be a clear hierarchy of spaces as public and private spaces can encourage different kinds of activities, interaction, self-expression and empowerment.

Scenario approach

After our meeting with Mr. Paatero we have now decided to continue the project with a scenario approach. We will work with three different scenarios. The scenarios will be called "Green", "Grid" and "Generator".

The "Green" scenario will consist of, as the name suggests, only renewable and clean energy resources. In this scenario we will try to design a energy system consisting of solar-, wind- and bioenergy. The "Grid" scenario will consist of wind- and bioenergy but also assuming that the village would be connected to the grid. The aim is produce as much as possible from the wind but complementing with electricity from the grid when the production from wind power drops. The "Generator" scenario will otherwise be like the "Grid" scenario but instead of complementing with electricity from the grid the village would have a diesel generator with an effect ranging between 100-150 kW.

All of the scenarios have their own pros and cons and we will try to indentify these and make some rough estimates of the total cost per kWh for the different scenarios.

Energy solution consultation with Mr. Paatero

We had an interesting meeting with researcer D. Sc. (Tech.) Jukka Paatero on the 20th March. According to Mr. Paatero, the best way to reach our objectives (a cost-efficient and self-sustainable energy system for Rock Village) would probably be a hybrid system.

So far, we have been dealing with three possible renewable energy solutions being solar, wind and bio. However, today we learned that going solely with solar would be very expensive. Also, converting bio to electricity is expensive, and it would be better to use bio for cooking etc. Just as we have been discussing. As the location is good for using wind energy, this would probably be the best solution for reaching our goals.

Mr. Paatero suggested we would do a comparison between two possible solutions. One with a wind-grid-hybrid and an other with a totally independent wind-diesel-hybrid. Good examples of wind-diesel-hybrids can be found for example in Alaska. This is something we will now be looking more deepely into.

According to Mr. Paatero, connection to grid could be a good solution as it is rather close and could be built quite cheaply (assisted by the people themselves). Also, a windfarm can also be easily and cheaply built by the people themselves. Examples of this can be found for example in Africa. In a self-built system the efficiency is somewhat lower, but it’s a cost-efficient solution.

Mr. Paatero had many interesting examples of various possibilities for reducing energy need in Rock Village. We could, for example, think about solar cookers, water-bottle-lighters for distributing sun light indoors, solar driers etc. In remote and rural areas, many innovative solutions have been developed. We will now look more deepely into the themes and examples given by Mr. Paatero and meet next time on Thursday 22th March.

Lebanon Climate Classification

According to Köppen−Geiger Climate Classification Map, Lebanon, as most of the Mediterranean countries, is classified as Csa area. 

C: warm temperate (main Climate)

s: dry summer (Precipitation)

a: hot summer Temperature