Future Shock

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Future Shock OPTIMIZED LAND USE MODEL FOR CHINO

ASLA 2009 Student Awards General Design Category Descriptive Data Summary Entry Number: 085 Level of Study: Undergraduate Individual or Team Entry: Team Entry Project Title: Future Shock Project Location: Chino, CA Project Type: Industrial

FU TU R E SHO CK

OPTIMIZED LAND USE MODEL FOR CHINO

PR OJEC T STAT EMENT

The challenges posed by our current resource hungry global economy and projected future natural resource constraints (a post peak oil future), will force a response against the invariance of contemporary landscape architectural practice, and also our consumerist cultures. By fusing ideas and methods of current and emergent technologies, as well as vertical farming and global economics, this project envisions the viability of a new bioplastics green industry for Chino, California.

an inevitable change in our industrial and consumption cycles. To a greater extent, these forces are creating a change in the overall human experience (future shock!).

As environmental designers attempt to forge

PR OJEC T N A R R AT I V E

an existence past this sickly era of capitalism and resource depletion, landscape architecture, both in theory and practice must be remodeled to perform against a worst case scenario, one independent of large injections of financial capital, and one that strives to critically investigate the capacity of the profession to respond to both environmental and economic demagoguery.

The effects of climate change, depleting oil

As a response to future shock, this project

reserves, volatile gasoline and commodity prices, marked with the incapacity of our financial systems to respond to the emergence of highly complex global capitalism, is set force

proposes a hybridized industrial model that strives to overcome the dissociative divide between environmentalism and capitalism, while critically engaging the public with the

discourse pertaining to consumer culture. This hybridized industrial model exploits multiple variable, innovative and highly optimized operative strategies for bioplastic manufacturing in Chino, CA. Bioplastic manufacturing is used as a program driver within the project due to the potential it offers for ecologic regeneration via biodegradability and up-cycling. Bioplastic production also has a potential for financial capital creation, through the harvesting, processing and global wholesale of biopolymers.

The overarching scheme of this model is the proliferation of an open ended future for “green” industry worldwide. Alternately, this scheme offers an industrial model for delinking the defunct-synergy that is inherently characteristic of petro-capitalism.

REGIONAL AND GLOBAL CONDITIONS

Located in the in the Inland Empire of Southern California, and approximately 35 miles

from Los Angeles, the region surrounding the city of Chino offers opportunities for the viability of a manufacturing industry that addresses the social issues of our current economic downturn, namely, unemployment and loss of taxable revenue, as well as environmental issues such as pollution and waste. The site is regional conditions are ideally suited for the emergence of a new “green” industry. The region has the labor supply, geophysical, transportation, and manufacturing factors of production that can support the growth, harvesting, processing and distribution of plant derived biopolymers for bioplastic production. These ideally suited local conditions allow for the distribution of locally made products on a global level.

CONCEPT

The concept of optimization and the imminent decay of specialization augment the strategy in realizing this project. This project assumes that

environmental stewardship is lost in singular purpose landscape interventions. With this assumption emerges the concept of optimizing multiple variable factors for sustainable industrial production. No longer can water treatment be the core of the profession’s ecological approach. This concept calls for the de-specializing of the profession and instead celebrates a hyper-specialized working model that blurs the thresholds between landscape, economics, environmentalism, manufacturing, biotech research and vertical farming.

The concept of this project agitates the status quo by forcing an intermingling of biotechnology, agriculture and landscape architecture in order to generate and sustain a cycle of technical knowledge flux between the disparate professions. Hence the processing, research and synthesis of plants with biopolymer starch properties will be carried out in a vertical farm.

D E L I V E R A B L ES

It would be naïve to assume that we can design ourselves out of a challenging resource constrained future. This is why the project explores both designed (vertical farm) and non designed solutions that can potentiate its continued economic and environmental sustenance. The resulting designed solution will mainly comprise of a vertical farm and research facilities for biopolymer production. This vertical farm will also have the capacity to further recycle and clean partially treated municipal water. On the other hand, the non designed solutions offered by the project are the open ended possibilities of the project to attract foreign direct investment, generate jobs and taxable revenue for the community through the sale and production of bioplastics, and also, to serve as an instrument that teaches the public about the issues pertaining to post consumption realities of recycling, environmental degradation, and waste.

Site Context + Plan The site is located 35 miles east of Los Angeles on land that has been historically used for agriculture. Prior to the economic downturn the city had made plans to designate the land for single family homes. The site oers more opportunities for sustainable land use as an alternative to residential development.

This is one of the few agricultural lands left in the Inland Valley of the Inland Empire.

Distribution Center

Agriculture

Manufacturing Campus

Los Angeles 10

35 Miles

Chino

Long Beach 5

Transit Stop

Vertical Farm Render

New Global Green Economy

Global Connections Given our current economic outlook, the Future re Shock land use model can serve as a special economic zone [ SEZ ] for green infrastructure research and production, just as Shenzhen served as China’s SEZ or the Silicon Valley as the pre-eminent zone for information technology [ IT ] and research.

Chino SEZ

What are Polymers?

Polymers are the basic chemical compounds found in plastics. Biopolymers are polymers which are produced and derived from natural organic sources such as plants and bacteria instead of petroleum

BIOPOLYMER SOURCES

POTATO STARCH plastarch material (psm)

80-90%

co2 Reduction

bio Plastics

CORN

CAIN SUGAR

BIODEGRADABLE catering biorganic waste bags diapers vegetable packaging bottles biodegradable mulch NONBIODEGRADABLE cell phones tire component car interiors fuel line and plastic pipes carpet fibers

BACTERIA

locally available locally available

polyactic acid (pla) plastics

COMMON APPLICATIONS

+

poly 3 hydroxybutyrate PHB bio derived polyethelyene

petro-plastic

vs bioplastic is renewable is less expensive is signiďŹ cantly less polluted is locally available

is non renewable is a pollution agent is expensive

x

x-5 five steps to

Ohio example

While Ohio is not known for its bioplastic production, it does have the largest polymer industry in the nation with over 2800 companies and $49 billion dollars in value. The state has created labor incentives through it’s universities, and collaborated with the public and private sectors in creating its polymer industry, Ohio serves as a reference point for Prado as the worlds preeminent eco-SEZ

realization read from x to 5

2

Regional advantage

The region surrounding the prado wetlands is in close proximity to the city of Ontario, Ca. With an international airport and rail lines, Ontario is a regional industrial hub which has the transportation, manufacturing, and distribution infrastructure to support a new “green” production industry. Some of the factory and storage spaces within the region which have been affected by the current economic downturn can be retooled to support the emergence of this “green collar industry.”

global bioplastic

2 1 The California advatage

U.S. nature works, Nebraska - PLA metabolix, Iowa - PLA, PHB, ceraplast, S. California - PHB, PLA PSM North America - PSM

Europe hycail - PLA galactic - PLA purac - PLA biopar - PHB

3

Japan (toyota) PLA

information technology

3 Prado SEZ research-development entertainment

Brazil (brazkem) BDP

13% U.S. GDP

4 Global investment

agriculture

5 Production green production The surplus availability of labor and the creation of intra State trade of raw materials like potato starch, makes this new industry even more relevant for our time.

Global Opportunitiess The design strategy outlines nondesign solutions that entail tapping into foreign direct investment for initial funding and to potentiate the projects economic sustainance. Through the sale of bio-plastics the project will gaurantee its own selfs fficiency su

The Prado SEZ would hope to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) from global leaders in the field.

Given our current economic outlook, the Future Shock model can serve as a special economic zone [ SEZ ] for green infrastructure research and production, just as Shenzhen served as China’s SEZ or the Silicon Valley as the pre-eminent zone for information technology [ IT ] and research.

Vertical Farming Bioplastics Process

X 10,000 = 50,000

.

Number of people experts predict can be feed by a 30-story farm

products VF

1

Acre of vertical farm

2D farm

=

raw polymers

20

Acres soil based farms

global distibution

synthesized

5%

Amount of Water needed for vertical farm as usage by equivalent conventional ones

14%

Percentage of greenhouse-gas emissions from farming

Design Derivation The hexagonic forms were derived from references to the chemical compositions of biopolymers y structures..

The image above shows manipulations of that hexagonal form. The forms were generated to maximize sun angles for the most eďŹƒcient climatic conditions for plant growth.

Site Imagery Facing East towards Vertical Farm Research Structure

Site Imagery Frontal View of facility

Vertical Farm Cross-Section The image below displays the water ter cycle needed for the growth of plants in n a vertical farm. The arrangement of oor planes in the vertical farm is used to maximize the eďŹƒciency of growth and production.

Holding Tank Exterior Solar Panelling

Hydroponic grown crops

Hydroponic Grown Crops

Crops + Research

Edible + Biopolymer Productive Crops

Exterior Solar Panelling

Municipal Grey Water - In

Treated Water To Wetlands - Out

Sun water

Natural Light Flow

Irrigation and Water

Sun Curtain Wall Automatic Windows 3 Vent Opening 4 Reective Surface 5 Floor 2 1 2

1

2 5 4 5

3

Ventilation Detail Sun Angled South Facing Slant

Air

Air Ventilation and Heating

Vertical Farm Details The details included above show how the vertical farm structure will function for ventilation, light, and nutrient exchange.

Vertical Farm Details (CONT’D) Vertic The image es below show the circulation and floor plans for tthe vertical farm. This includes the interior an nd exterior.

Research + Storage Gallery

Cafe

Crop Areas Information Lobby hydroponics

Research lab

Typical Floor Plan

FLOOR PLANS

From Station Pedestrian Circulation

CIRCULATION DIAGRAM

Ground Floor Plan

Visitor Center

GREEN

GROW

Biodegradable plastics produced from plant and animal synthesis.

HARVEST JOBS Harvesting bio-degradable plastics woul ould create a capacity for e employment for the local pop pulation.

C R E AT E

PRODUCE

Researchers would be able to produce bio-plastics from their harvest.

MONEY Distribution and production of this product will bring signiďŹ cant value of economic wealth to the region.

DISTRIBUTE

GREEN

CORN

SUGAR CANE

TOMATOES

LETTUCE

POTATOES

These plants will be used primarily for edible purposes. They can be grown hydroponically, in vertical farm environment, and in a greenhouse.

There plants have a productive value for their starch derived biopolymers which be further synthesized to produce bio-degradable plastics.

PLANT LIST

Productive Plant Listt The functionality of plants are embraced on the site rather than the aesthetic value. This compiled list identiďŹ es the productive plants that will be used on the site.

Tomatoes Lettuce Cane Sugar Potato Corn

Solanum lycopersicum Lactuca sativa Saccharum Solanum tuberosum Zea mays

1,000 JOBS CREATED

100 MILLION TONS OF BIOPOLYMERS GENERATED

250,000 SQ. FT. OF BIOPLASTIC PROCESSING PLANTS

200 ACRES OF FARMLAND