Hello
everyone,
The
Mid-review presentation went okay but not great in any sense. We were only 3
guys (Ville, Sakari and Konrad) plus Aino present. We fortunately had some time
to discuss both before and after the actual presentation-session and we decided
that we need to take some action now. It is not important that we immediately
start producing text for our final report but we definitely need to come up
with a clear focus and decide on what our final goal with the project will be.
This is why we decided to have a bunch of meetings in the upcoming 2 weeks. On
Monday the 14th we will need to present our final scope to Matleena
and Olli so it is crucial that we could have as many meetings as possible
before this. The meeting times are discussed in the mails sent to the
participants.
All of us
present on Monday got something out of seeing the other groups’ presentations
and we already discussed changing our scope in accordance with what we learned.
The main change would be to get rid of all high-flying ideas and focus on one
or a few simple, achievable and cheap solutions that easily could be applied on
a small scale and then expanded when necessary. What we have discussed so far
is rainwater-collection both from roofs and in separate structures, treatment
of graywater for reuse, small-scale biogas production, composting and maybe
irrigation systems.
Rainwater
collection from roofs is a very simple but also useful solution. As it would be
integrated to the buildings themselves it is a good example of a phase 1
solution for us that is as applicable to one unit as it would be to the whole
Rock Village. Reuse of graywater requires the use of certain hygienic products
free of toxins etc. and some sort of simple treatment but this should be easily
manageable. The water collected through these two systems would most probably
not cover the needs of the Rock Village, it’s gardens and tree-plantations but
it could cover a significant proportion of these needs.
As long as
there are some animals present at the Rock Village small scale biogas reactors
would be a sustainable, cheap and simple solution to produce gas for cooking. A
larger system would require many inhabitants so we feel that we should focus on
a small scale alternative and be happy about the fact that a small portion of
the energy needs could be covered. The digested manure could be used as
fertilizer but in addition to this a composting station would be a very simple
and cheap way to produce better quality fertilizer for the gardens and
agriculture. All of the ideas mentioned above are connected to gardening and
agriculture and could therefore be presented as a system.
Concentrating
on these kinds of simple solutions means that our plans have a much greater
chance of getting implemented in the Rock Village and we should have the
professional expertise to make the sufficient planning steps. If we want to
focus on making the Rock Village a model for the surrounding farmers and
villagers these easily applicable solutions are a much better idea then
something technical and expensive such as wind- or solar-power.
Our next
meeting is set for Thursday 3.4, 11.00 at Kaisatalo. Hope as many as possible
of you can make it. If it looks like you’ll have a problem making it to the 3
meetings we’ve planned and discussed in the mails then please have a look at
the Doodle and suggest one for yourself!
Have a pleasant
day,
Konrad
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