| EcoSphere
is a small scale project with a clear mission [link] that
can produce usable knowledge in a number of areas applicable
to a wide range of future projects: affordable
housing, green building, alternative energy applications,
technology integration, movable structures, new form-factors,
glass structures of larger
scale,
and
ultimately, megacities
and other new building types. EcoSphere is designed
to be a living lab for the entire process
of creating and using habitat: R&D, design, fabrication,
building,
using and the dissemination of the accumulated knowledge. |
| EcoSphere
is, perhaps, the smallest project possible in which
so much can be tested and from which so much can be
learned. It is affordable for four reasons: first,
because it is not large; second, because most of the
technology involved is at that stage where a real application
is possible; third, because there is a use for the
structure that can be paid for by money that will be
spent anyway; fourth, because EcoSphere is designed
to be moved thereby significantly altering the land
cost
factor. |
| This
article outlines a Business Model. It is the argument
why EcoSphere should be built now and why a ValueWeb
[link] should
form to do it. It shows how the members of
this ValueWeb can profit, in many different ways, from
the experience. |
The
following Questions have to be answered:
Why
do this project now?
What
is unique about this project?
What
is the fundamental technologies involved;
and, once demonstrated how can they be
scaled for benefit? What
knowledge can it produce that other options
cannot?
Who
is needed to participate - and why?
What
is the scale of the total investment? What
kinds of return are possible?
How
will those who invest profit?
What
are the consequences of doing this project
- or not?
To
meet the project timing goals, what has
to happen - and by when?
What
happens with the IP and Intellectual
Capital that is generated?
How
do you get involved?
What
will be the organizational Model?
How
will the project be managed?
Where
will the prototype be first placed? |
|
|
|
| There
are many forces that indicate that now is the time
to do this. Some are general and some are specific
to the Calgary projects. Together they make a compelling
argument. The question is if a ValueWeb (i.e. an integrated, creative market)
[link] will
form, at this time, to see it through. |
| On
the global level there are many trends and drivers:
truly affordable housing does not exist at any significant
scale; People’s awareness and desire for better ecological
solutions has made a dramatic increase in recent years.
Interest in high quality small domiciles has, remarkably,
returned The US economy is “recovering” but not in
a way many expected - it is leaderless, without identity
or passion Materials and technology breakthroughs
in building skins, energy, waste and water cycles management
has given us
a rich tool kit to draw from while scarcity and prices
in these areas continue to climb. People continue to
get educated to advanced technologies in their transpiration
options and consumer good yet housing just goes on
and on - as always - only more bloated. This is a great
time to bring alternatives to the market, to bring
design and integration to bear on the myriad of existing
pieces and make a real solution. There is a set of
trends without a name waiting to be ignited, ready
for a symbol and a voice. |
| In
Calgary, we have the Master’s Academy project and enterprises
and the Design/Build/use ValueWeb we are assembling
to design the “school of the Future” [link].
Money spent on hotel rooms and rentals for the MGT
part of this team alone, over the span of the project,
will pay back the “mortgage” on an EcoSphere. The first
question
is just
where do
you want this money to go and to buy what level of
work-life style? The second question is if this money
should - or not - be spent in a way that informs the
project or merely supports the real-estate-method-in-place
[link]?
To provide for myself and the team and to inform the
project, time is of the essence as the Phase I NavCenter
and the basic planning for the new Campus (Phase II)
will take place over the next year. It is all a matter
of how you want to Vote with your money and how much
leverage you want from it. |
| And
then,
EcoSphere and the recreated Usonian House [link] are
but two projects on the path to affordable housing [link]. |
|
| There
is a great deal of R&D, demonstration and new
architectural realities packed into a small, thus
affordable,
space. Besides the thing of it, the process by
which it is built - while not new in its parts -
is new
in the degree of integration between the building
form and the method of fabrication/building.
This is an exercise in lean design and construction. |
| The
project is unique in its ValueWeb organization, in
that it is both an end in itself and a precursor
to several specific other designs. Also unique is
having the lead designer live in it and practice it
into reality - and document the results. Architecture,
as a profession, has no systematic R&D process. Design,
engineering, building and using are, in actuality,
practiced as separate businesses. In design, exterior
and interior work are most often separated. It is
a fragmented profession and not very efficient in
the economic sense. The tight integration of EcoSphere
demands a level and style of collaboration that is
unusual. |
| In
architecture today, R&D is generally accomplished
with big “signature” projects where cost is not the
object and the experimentation can be absorbed in
the scale of the project. This is a high profile,
star studded system that is highly
competitive
with
reputations
at stake. Not really a good learning environment. |
|
| The
core technologies to do EcoSphere already exist.
There are places where the state-of-the-art can be
pushed and the choice to do so is a factor of time
and money. Also, the range between a “craft” solution
and a “manufactured” one is also variable and a factor
of time and money. It is the integration of
systems, the integration of design, build,
use, the integration of artifact and life-style
and the form-factor of
the design that opens up many new possibilities for
innovation. |
| The
fundamental technology in this exercise is the application
of the GROUP GENIUS processes to the artful assembling
of many techniques and technologies into a solution
that has never existed before and that can inform
the creation of larger and more complex structures. |
|
| Unique
knowledge will come into this project, unique knowledge
will be created by it and unique knowledge will be
distributed because of it. What is unique is what
is sideband in other efforts. Most go after
what they think they need to know rather than seeking
what the want to learn. EcoSphere is not a tool -
it is a work of art [link].
In creating it - we learn. |
| The
learning is in the doing. It is not in the
abstractions of engineering and design nor in the
project plans, field management and budgets. These
are important tools, means and methods and
of course they will be refined. The unique learning
is in the making and living in a work of art that
rests gently on the Earth, respects all nature and
augments all life. That is what we do not know how
to do nearly well enough even given our tremendous
knowledge, social organization and economy. |
| We
have forgotten the simple things of life and we do
not know how to integrate them with the mechanisms
of our sophisticated technological society. |
| Strange
words for a Business Model? No, only a strange
world that would think it so. Business, once, was
about
making and delivering GOODS. What is the
good now? This is a serious question. We are
running out of time and are the first generation
that will leave the mess to ourselves; the habits
[link] of UpSideown Economics have to be offered
an alternative. |
| Learning
how to live gently is not about giving up -
it is about expanding what we consider to be in
the game we call human life. EcoSphere seeks
to be inclusive - it respects nature even as it embraces
it. It treds lightly and it is proud. When
it is time to go, it leaves the Earth as it was.
It provides an unique viewpoint of the world
and life. It frames a way-of-life. It is not consumptive. |
| Can
we learn how to to do this? |
|
| We
need people who want to know - who need to
learn. To them and them only we can offer a gift. |
| And,
of course, we need competency. Competency in design,
engineering, fabrication, building, business; in
real estate, logistics, scheduling, research, deal
making; facilitation, communication, education, documentation
and finance; in landscaping, gardening, energy and
transportation management, nutrition, cooking
and personal hygiene. |
| EcoSphere,
as designed, presents an organized yet open-end problem
for a vast array of disciplines. No assumption
about living and work processes can go unchallenged
in this process. Yet, this is not a 10 year research
project. We have to bring existing knowledge to bear
in record time, discover and invent as we go, and
build a building that is not static and dead the
day it is finished. |
| We
need people who can do this and are capable and willing
to bring money, tools and personal time to the project. |
| We
need people who can live with the ambiguity of a project
where everything is not tied down from the very beginning;
who can work in an environment of trust and not take
advantage of a situation but work to bring the project
and the whole team through intact. |
| We
need Cathedral Builders who can have fun
doing it. |
|
| I
estimate that the total necessary investment is in
the realm of $1,000,000 three hundred of which will
have
to
be cash with the rest being “in-kind” and
product contributions. Even a great deal of the the
300 can
be turned into “capital” if we can turn
field labor into a “capital investment.”A
big chunk of this cost will be in R&D and engineering
along with
the
project
management
time of getting all the product companies and fabricators
lined up. EcoSphere will have a fair degree of technology
augmentation including “smart building” components,
multimedia and communication capabilities [link].
As noted
[link],
the skin of the building is the most challenging
aspect of the design and the most expensive. The
energy systems can also be approached in a relatively
conservative or radical way [link].
In all of these aspects, the idea is to take a middle
road approach: push the art but don’t
break the project. |
| The
EcoSphere prototype must be a business success even
if it does not lead right away to a business. It
does this by meeting the financial goals of the prototype
and by meeting the agreed upon expectations of each
investor. |
|
| No
matter the kind of investment made, there are many
kinds of return for those who participate in this
project. Some will want one or the other, some many,
some
all of them. |
| I
sum these up as recreation, satisfaction, learning,
professional advancement, idea or product demonstration,
personal use, D/B/U team experience, revenue and
equity building. |
| Depending
on one’s situation, one or a mix of these may
be attractive. The idea is that everyone coming into
the project and ValueWeb has a unique contribution
to
make and also an unique set of requirements that
determine what makes a good “return” for
them. Each relationship, therefore, requires on a
different
deal. Fairness is not giving everyone the same thing.
Fairness
is giving each what works for them. This is the mass
customization of contracting. |
|
| The
notion of profits flows out of the idea of personal
returns. Other than personal rewards, there will
be no financial profits unless EcoSphere reaches
a market of some consequence. This is a long term
proposition
and it involves all the risks associated with any
business venture. However, profiting from one’s investment
in other ways is entirely dependent on the the quality
of the effort put in and the integrity of how the
project is run no matter how far it gets down the
road (at this cycle) to built reality and use. Each
iteration of the work will be “finished” and documented.
Each step advances the cause and brings us closer
to the end result. |
|
| The
consequences here are not insignificant. EcoSphere
is a small project but the world is different
with it than without it. |
| Bucky
Fuller designed the first Dymaxion house in 1927[link].
He did a full prototype in 1947 [link].
The prototype was successful even though unusual
[link] and
thousands sent in their orders unsolicited. The production
houses were estimated to cost about
the
same as
a new luxury car of the time - this made it affordable
to the average home owner [link];
however, Fuller walked away from the project when
he feared that business interests would exploit it.
Fuller’s concept was that the housing industry
would become a service industry much like the phone
company
[link]. |
| In
the mid-70s, I found myself riding to the Kansas
City airport with Bucky. He made it quite plain that
he considered the housing industry of that time,
unprofessional, corrupt and hidebound - an evaluation
that I shared having already had over five years
experience doing projects for developers as a designer,
field
engineer and project manager on projects ranging
from small semi-custom subdivisions to a city of
40,000.
I shared with him my perception that it was fear
and
the inability
to
see the transition to a new way of working that was
the problem and I told him of my then still nascent
ideas of how to overcome this - ideas that 5 years
later, with Gail’s partnership, were to become MG
Taylor Corporation [link].
He looked at me and said “you, you will build my
house,
I will
never
build it; you and others like you will.” It was a
startling moment and one I have never forgotten.
And I have not forgotten my promise to build his
house. I have spent most of my since refining the
method by which this can be done. It is
not, primarily, a technological problem. |
| EcoSphere,
while a geodesic structure that employs many of Bucky’s
ideas, is not, of course, Bucky’s house. It
will be an artful mix of technological and traditional
materials.
Wood is a warmer material, renewable, easier to work
than metal and, if used properly like in modern boat
construction, remarkably strong. Today, the best
economy is the Lean approach mixing the
best materials, processes and resource strategies
to come
out with the best results. In Bucky’s version,
the house could be deployed anywhere in the world
- he
demonstrated this 50 years ago and did it repeatedly.
With EcoSphere, we will ship information first,
critical components second and rely on local fabrication
where/when it makes sense. Never-the-less,
in spirit, this is a small piece of Bucky’s
dream. |
| I
bring this story about Bucky into this Business Model
because it is highly relevant to the subject of consequences.
I was 9 years old when Bucky prototyped his house.
I am over 66 now [in early 2005]. It is still not
built and the principles upon which it was based
remain
at
the
fringe of
our society. The impact on the Earth, as a consequence
of how we
build, it what it is - and it is not good. It does
not take much imagination to see what another half
century
of what the present
design strategies
will render. |
| There
are always good reasons not to start a diet, today;
not to start living healthier, take the effort to
improve education, stop polluting, or start saving
for the future - or thinking about the future
at
all. The consequences, however, cannot be escaped.
Nature doesn’t care. |
| It
is time we learned how to habitat better. |
|
| Before
timing we first have to outline the tasks: a site
has to be found. The basic structure engineered.
A business organization established. A project bank
account and financial controls. A project web site
established with a means of exchanging information,
files and facilitating dialog; Rules-of-Engagement
established. The producer network of the ValueWeb
chosen. A cost model created. A legal agreement
covering organizational structure, ownership, control,
IP protection and sharing, rules about how any resulting
products will be employed. The necessary capital
attracted and design-engineering assignments agreed
to. Suppliers and manufactures contacted and enrolled
in the program. |
| Then,
the work can begin. |
| Different
glazing and structural components will have to be
engineered, fabricated, tested and selected. Tooling
set up. Final fabrication drawings completed. Materials
ordered; and, the manufacturing of structural and
interior components completed; the modular shipping
trailer set up followed by permitting, site preparation,
shipping, field
erection, any necessary field work
and then the
debugging of systems. |
| The
move-in process includes landscaping (exterior and
interior), starting the garden and fish pond, furnishings
(not much of this) and goods: dishes, glassware,
silverware, towels and so on - all products to be
evaluated, selected and purchased. |
| The
energy and water systems will have to be “charged”
- depending on the time of year, it will take time
for the system to reach stability. |
| Now,
the process of learning how to live in EcoSphere
begins. Don’t forget the celebration - and documentation. |
| And
throughout all this, an interactive web site has
to be maintained to engage in the market exploration/creation
process, as well as, support any parallel prototyping
projects that may arise. |
| What
is the best that can be expected? A month to find
out if there is a basis for a project. Three months
to do the initial design and engineering. In the
meantime, funding, land and the full team can be
secured. Then, three months to do design development
and component testing. A month to set up the final
fabrication process. In this period permits can be
acquired and site preparation can begin. Three
months to fabricate and ship. One month to erect
and debug.
This adds up to 12 months as a generally best case
scenario. This means spring 2005. |
| This
schedule is in parallel with the building of Master’s
Phase I NavCenter project and the planning work of
the Phase II new Campus. |
| It
would be useful if the EcoSphere project schedule
could be accelerated so that the “informing” of Master’s
Phase I could be greater. This, however, is not feasible
unless a far greater amount of cash would come into
the project very quickly and/or a larger team, assembled,
quickly, able to give it dedicated attention. And,
as long as a year is, a shorter time does not
leave
the necessary
time
for thinking and design. This project should have
started a year or two ago and there is no easy way
of making this up. |
|
| IP
when it comes into the project will be registered
and respected. IP created within the project will
be shared according to the rules established at the
beginning. How each project member employs the Intellectual
Capital they derive from their involvement will be
governed by the project covenant that all will sign
at the beginning. These rules and covenant will be
drafted as the first piece of legal work. |
|
| It
starts with an e-mail or phone call. Decide what
you are willing to contribute and under what conditions
including what you want out of it. Even small amounts
of money will be useful. Systematic and validated
knowledge is gold. The willingness to contribute
labor (be
it engineering or physical) will make a big difference
as long as you are a self-starter-organizer. |
| There
is much to do besides making a prototype. We will
need to build a web site, produce plans, provide
a service to support local owner-builders - this
means, besides web-delivered services, a network
of local
engineers, architects and builders to offer work
or consulting. This capacity, of course, then creates
the basis for the Post Usonian Project [link].
We certainly will want to produce a video of both
the design-engineering process, the fabrication-construction
process and living in the environment. This requires
many forms of knowledge-work. |
|
| It
goes without saying that none of this can be construed
as an “Offering.” The legal aspects will have to
be designed and engineered along with everything
else. Until we know we have sufficient support for
the project and until we know the nature of it, the
form of the organization cannot be foretold. |
| A
likely Model is what we did when we published The
Most Amazing Thing [link].
We created an LLC and valued everyone’s contribution
which gave them
a
position
in all the down stream revenues in a property that
was clearly described. This is the “movie-making”
model. In the case of EcoSphere, there are a
wider range of reasons to invest, a wider range of
contributions and, I expect, a greater variety of
“returns” required. The organizational Model will
have to reflect this variety. |
|
| The
project management process will employ the full Taylor
NavCenter processes and tool kit. |
| The
processes learned from the NASA and Swimming Pool
stories will be systematically applied [link]. |
|
| At
the present time the most likely place for the prototype
will be Calgary, Canada. With master’s Academy project
[link], this is the most relevant place for immediate
application and the project will also require a great
deal of of my presence over the next three to five
years. I have to live somewhere, I will be spending
the money to do so, EcoSphere will require documentation.
The weather conditions are both challenging and ideal
for this kind of experiment. All this adds up. |
| It
is, of course, possible to prototype more than one
EcoSphere if there is both the human to “drive it”
and and financial means to produce it. |
| One
goal of the project is to get to a marketable owner-build,
shop fabricated product and can be produced at some
scale. It will take one to a maximum of three prototypes
to achieve this. Even these prototypes will get significantly
less expensive, each iteration. A production level
of 5 units a month will yield healthy cost reductions
and the basis of a business. |
| In
time, it will be possible to adapt EcoSphere to wide
range of climes. Economy, however, will require both
a distributed and locally adaptable production methods.
Much of the structure, skin components and interior
components can be fabricated out of the present AI
shop. However, in time, and with greater production,
shipping costs can be reduced by finding local and
regional shops to work under license. |
|
| A
ValueWeb architecture with MG Taylor as systems
integrator will assemble a Design/Build/Use
Team to build a prototype (one to three) of the EcoSphere
concept. Each member of these Producer, User, Investor
Inner Clamshell Networks [link] will join according to their own individual contribution,
risk
and profit profile,
and
therefore,
agreed upon rules-of-engagement. |
| The
MG Taylor NavCenter environment and system will be
employed to manage the project. This will involve
the full use of the 10 Step Process thus
creating an Archive and KnowledgeBase of the
experience. Existing MG Taylor, SFIA-Master Builders
and AI capabilities will be employed, as well as,
new enterprise members as they join. |
| A
FasTrack process will be employed with the
goal of placing the prototype in Calgary in time
to inform
the Master’s D/B/U Team in both Phases I and
II of that project and to provide living-work space
for
Matt Taylor and visits from state-side members of
the MGT Team at market rent rates. Free EcoSphere
capacity will be made available to the ValueWeb members
at agreed upon terms. |
| If
the EcoSphere resources and capacities do not assemble
fast enough to meet this objective, other prototyping
locations and schedules will be considered including
“shelving” the project for a period of time if necessary.
In any circumstance, continuity will be maintained
and the project pursued until it is completed, morphs
into something else or is proven a failure. |
| Concurrent
with the prototyping process, an EcoSphere web site
will be established augmented with WIKIs and BLOGs.
The purpose of this effort will be to explore the
creation of the Middle ValueWeb Clamshell necessary
for the building of a viable business. At this point,
consideration will be given to the possible merger
of the Usonian
One and Work Conservatory projects. |
| A
PROTOCOL will be established, from the beginning
of the project, to identify Intellectual Property and
Intellectual Capital coming into the project,
developed during the project and the rules-of-engagement
by which both can be employed by the Enterprise members
- within the enterprise scope and outside of it. |
| There
are several kinds and scale of business activities
that can emerge from this project, progressively:
an information exchange and clearing house; owner-builder
plans with component manufacturing and professional
support services; licensing of local professionals
and production shops; adding new products and scaling,
over time, to a full-service affordable housing company.
As part of the ongoing, facilitated, business development
process, these options will be explored by the Enterprise
members and the appropriate opportunities pursued. |
| The
estimated “capitalization” of this start-up is one
million dollars - this is based on the market value
of all contributions including design, engineering,
land use, manufacturing and building, enterprise
overhead and planning. Of this, as much as 300 thousand
or as low as 50
thousand
in
cash
will
be
required
depending on the level of in-kind and product contributions
made. After an accurate financial model is created,
a fixed initial valuation will be declared and
all contributions will be factored accordingly. |
| This
Business Model outlines a means to the creation of
an unique piece of architecture as well as a means
to evolving a business based on the result. Both
of these are heuristic processes. There is inherent
risk in any start up. There is compounded risk when
the state-of-the-art is being pushed and when the
market cannot be predicted. There is no way to guess
that there is a market for EcoSphere of
one or ten thousand. There is no way before expending
engineering effort to know how far down the sustainable
continuum EcoSphere can be taken with the first prototype
- or three. There is no way to bracket EcoSphere
costs, as a prototype and as an eventual product,
within a 300 percent spread, until engineering is
done and
a considerable about of fabrication/construction
analysis is performed. However, there are things
that are known: EcoSphere is build-able. It can be
very green and sustainable. It can be movable with
breakdown and set up times within a week. There is
at least one buyer who can utilizes the environment
in such a way that can be afforded given the likely
costs. Based on the response to my web site alone,
there is ample evidence that there exists a large
and growing population that is seeking affordable
alternative architectural solutions [link]. |
| There
are three valid motives for joining this Enterprise.
You may have one, two, three or all.
The first and the major one is to see it done, to
experience
the ValueWeb and rapid prototyping processes and
to acquire the personal Intellectual Capital
that is the inevitable result - this is an individual
learning, professional enhancement and social investment
motive. The second is to test out an idea or product
in an environment
where
you
and your property will be respected and the feedback
you get will be reliable - this is an Intellectual
Capital and personal business return motive. The
third, for the business entrepreneur, is the belief
that there
is,
in
fact,
an economic pony in there somewhere and a market
exists or can be developed within which one can build
a profitable enterprise - this is the motive to grow
capital.
This one, however, is a lengthy journey and we are
just on
the starting
path. |
| All
this said you have a choice. You can look at your
marginal utility of cash, ideas, talent and social
capital and you can decide how to invest it. Your
investment can be large or small. A new car this
year, a way out vacation, an advance in life-style,
a conventional investment - and/or EcoSphere. You
choose. Any way you go is valid and only you can
make the
decision. You have to determine which is more rewarding.
Only you can access the short range and long term
consequences. |
If
you want to play the EcoSphere game contact me.
e-mail |
|
|
|
| Return
of the Usonian Project |
|
|
Matt
Taylor
Nashville VCBH
March 22, 2004
SolutionBox
voice of this document:
VISION • STRATEGY • DESIGN DEVELOPMENT
|
|
posted:
March 22, 2004
revised:
March 23, 2004
• 20040322.335111.mt • 20040323.200982.mt •
(note:
this document is about 85% finished)
copyright© Matt
Taylor 1967, 1975, 1979, 2002, 2003, 2004
|
|
