Regenerative Design

re-equilibrating soil carbon, ice sheets, ocean temperatures and associated sea-level rise all have their intrinsic long timescales that will result in ongoing changes for hundreds to thousands of years after the global surface temperature has been stabilized.

Increases in global mean surface temperature (GMST), relative to pre-industrial levels, affect processes involved in desertification (water scarcity), land degradation (soil erosion, vegetation loss, wildfire, permafrost thaw) and food security (crop yield and food supply instabilities). (IPCC, 2019a, P14) These changing processes drive risks to food systems, livelihoods, infrastructure, land value, and human and ecosystem health. Even the changes in one process may result in the compound risks.

While the climate is changing, human face extreme weather and limited resource in the future. It will influence development, especially for the growing cities. The regenerative designs integrate society’s needs with the integrity of nature design to enhance resilience and sustainability for the community. The regenerative designs are influenced by approaches found in the biomimicry, biophilic design, ecological economics, circular economics. A new generation of designers is applying ecologically inspired design to agriculture, architecture, community planning, cities, enterprises, economics and ecosystem regeneration. (Daniel Christian Wahl, 2016) Many designers use the resilient models observed in systems ecology in their design process and recognize that ecosystems are resilient primarily because they operate in closed-loop systems.

On the other hands, sustainable development is another aim for the regenerative design. In comparison, sustainable development’s highest goal is to satisfy fundamental human needs today without compromising future generations’ possibility to satisfy theirs. The regenerative design aims to develop restorative systems that are beneficial for humans and other species. This regeneration process is participatory and individual to the community and environment it is applied to. This process intends to revitalize communities, human and natural resources, and society.

The regenerative design has involved the construction industry since 1976 that professor Lyle challenged his landscape architecture graduate students at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona to “envision a community in which daily activities were based on the value of living within the limits of available renewable resources without environmental degradation.” Thus, the research is looking for the solution of climate changes and Anthropocene problems with regenerative designs.