Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Harnessing the awesome heat power of...people

We have all been in places where the crush of human bodies has resulted in uncomfortable temperatures. In some places this unavoidable occurrence can only be countered with a large mechanical cooling system.

Until someone discovers a way to utilize this energy.

The Stockholm Central Station is configuring a mechanical system that instead of simply removing the excess heat from station they intend to capture this energy to heat an adjacent office building.

The proposed system will utilize a closed loop heat transfer system that will distribute water warmed up by people in the Central Station to a new office building that will house a small hotel and a few shops.

The additional cost of the pipes and pumps is not, by itself, cheap. However projections of system use offer a 20% reduction in energy use from a standard heating system that when added to overall cost of the building makes the added cost seem "not that much" according to Karl Sundholm of Jerhuset, a property administration company run by Swedish government.

If proved viable restructuring building systems to take advantage of the occupant usage instead of merely treating building program as a 'problem to be solved' may become an effective way to structure design solutions for occupied projects. Besides generating power (don't forget to check out this link on crowd farming) I wonder what other potential solutions are in the proposal phase...

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