We often hear about new and groundbreaking technologies, the race to the top with the latest innovations and scientific breakthroughs.
At its most ambitious we can see this in the rush to invest in unproven carbon capture and sequestration technology, and the interest in green hydrogen energy.
While all these new technologies are of course exciting and breakthroughs are essential to solving the climate crisis, we shouldn’t dismiss what we already have – and we may be far better off for it.
Marry that with the modern technology our bright sparks have come up with in the past decades, and you have a winner.
Harnessing ancient materials and design methodologies can be more affordable, have less embodied carbon, the best of all – are already proven to work.
For biophilic inspiration that might shock you, take a look at the Indigenous living bridges of India, carefully woven over decades from living Ficus elastica as its roots stretch outwards across the river.
Their ingenious natural design means that the bridges are carbon positive, living structures – and according to our scan of available research probably stronger than concrete bridges, lasting hundreds of years,
Then there’s good old mud.
This natural material is highly efficient in buildings, not only at keeping occupants cool in summer and warm in winter, but also withstanding extreme weather.
Yemen’s walled city of Sana’a is dominated by rammed earth skyscrapers.
According to some it could well serve us into the future.
“It is the architecture of the future,” Salma Samar Damluji, co-founder of the Daw’an Mud Brick Architecture Foundation in Yemen, told the BBC’s Isabelle Gerretsen.
Mud structures are still being constructed today as an affordable solution for regions with high temperatures, with Austrian architect Anna Heringer constructing the METI school in Bangladesh from mud, straw and bamboo.
Because while human-caused climate change may be a modern problem, heat certainly isn’t.
Humanity has been hiding from the heat under trees and in caves for as long as we’ve learnt to walk upright.
The problem is that we know cooling buildings in our modern world is exceptionally energy intensive – the number of airconditioning units is expected to more than triple worldwide by 2050, consuming as much electricity as China and India currently use.
What’s wrong with a hobbit house?
Going underground to escape the heat isn’t a new phenomenon – from Australia’s Coober Pedy to Turkey’s ancient Derinkuyu Underground City, discovered in the 1960s.
This allows occupants to escape the heat of the summer and winter’s cool nights. But this methodology seems to be beneathus, nowadays. What’s wrong with a little hobbit house?
Passive cooling is not new
Here’s where architects employ passive cooling and building envelopes that separate the building interior from the exterior. This can provide significant thermal comfort by reducing indoor temperature and result in energy savings of up to 70 per cent.
India’s intricate lattice architecture is another testament to the ingenuity of ancient design practices; modern architects are now searching for ways to keep buildings cool, they need to take a look at these structures.
Take the Microsoft office in Noida, northern India. It takes design inspiration from the Taj Mahal, with “jaali” (meaning net) perforated lattice screens and arched doorways.
Jaali is a distinct architectural feature in India that emerged in the 16th century, and can be seen in the intricate latticework of the Taj Mahal, built in the city of Agra in the mid-17th century, and the Hawa Mahal, built in 1799 in Jaipur.
By providing shade but still allowing light to penetrate the floor plate, this architectural feature helps keep the building’s carbon footprint low. It is one of the reasons the Microsoft office has a Leed (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) platinum rating, the US Green Building Council’s highest sustainability certification.
Similarly, the building below is in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Designed by Vo Trong Nghia Architects, it revives a centuries-old pottery tradition with its intricate facade.
Although they might be countries apart, what these architects have in common is a desire to reach back in time and take the best of design traditions that evolved over hundreds or thousands of years, and apply them to modern-day contexts and problems.
And they do it successfully.
Wind catchers and water systems
Taking terracotta lattices to the next level, this porous terracotta airconditioning system was informed by Egyptian architecture and traditional Palestinian cooling systems.
Designed for autonomous cooling of spaces in desert buildings, it incorporates an automatic irrigation system to effectively cool the space.
Yael Issacharov’s Nave is based on the work of Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy and the Palestinian Jara, a traditional terracotta water container that was suspended from the ceiling and was used to keep the space and drinking water cool.
Another terracotta and water airconditioning system is Ant Studio’s low-energy air conditioner that uses water and terracotta pots to cool hot air.
People have been using some form of airconditioning to keep cool for thousands of years.
Take the ancient Persian “wind catcher” or bâdgir that rises above the skyline, “catching” wind and funnelling it down into the interior below.
In the UK, around 7000 versions of wind catchers were installed in public buildings such as the Royal Chelsea Hospital in London between 1979 and 1994.
And in the US, a visitor centre at Zion National Park in southern Utah records a temperature difference of 16 degrees Celcius between the interior and exterior – in the middle of a desert.
And then there’s the Persian conical structures called a yakhch?l, which has been used to make ice in a desert – since at least as far back as 400 BC.
The best known building material for thousands of years
The move to tall timber towers, for instance, is an interesting trend. It seems to be a growing trend in Australia and overseas with clients wanting to outdo each other with the are asking for the “tallest” orand the “biggest” timber structure to offer corporate tenants.
It’s a welcome step away from the concrete and steel monoliths that have dominated the skyline for the past century. And a movestep back to our roots.
Humans have used timber for thousands of years and it has proved to be one of the most versatile and low carbon materials we know out there (at least, far less carbon than concrete and steel).
These technologies are not new innovations. They have been around for thousands of years, but today other than timber which is making a big comeback, we seem to think they’re not right for us. Why? Because they’re not high tech and “cool” enough?
Sometimes we need to stop waiting for the next big thing to happen, and work with what we already have.
People have been making buildings for thousands of years.
People have been dealing with heat for thousands of years.
We can’t wait for solutions to be invested when the problems are already here.
The climate crisis won’t wait for the next big technological breakthrough to come to market.
Let’s look for time-tested solutions for our biggest problems.
Sometimes, the best solution is the one that’s already there.