What If Buildings Created Energy Instead of Consuming It? | Ksenia Petrichenko | TED

Buildings are bad news for the climate -- but they don't have to be. While our structures are currently responsible for a third of global energy consumption and emissions, a future where they create more energy than they produce is possible. Energy policy analyst Ksenia Petrichenko has a three-tiered strategy for thinking differently about buildings, transforming them from passive users to active players in the energy system and bringing us closer to our climate targets.

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[plyric]

Fantastic TED Talk! I'm aiming to build my new house to LEED Platinum-level certification, but I'll be happy if I hit Gold-level certification. There are SO MANY ancient building technologies, as well as new and upcoming technologies, which we can use for building our homes and yet still have our modern conveniences! I'm still a beginner in learning this stuff, but things like building walls with rammed-earth/no cement, having a rainwater-harvesting system with a cistern for the outdoor gardening, using radiant floor heating for increased heating efficiency, adding towers for passive evaporative cooling reducing reliance on air conditioning and more! I am highly excited about the new things I learn everyday on how to not only reduce my carbon footprint, but also to reduce my utility cost in the future during my retirement. It'll be nice not paying an arm and a leg for utilities when I get old. 🥰

[alkafass]

wow wonderful topic really it's so important to transform building from consumption to productive

[ryans]

Im pretty sure they got rid of that tech in 1800s-early 1900s. Most big old buildings had their antiquitechs removed to get rid of free electricity.

[joesackbaron]

It's great in theory. The trouble with all this is, is that it requires everything to be rebuilt - again. Take an office block for example - efficient for energy use to all people working from home, as a bus or train is, to individuals all going by car. An energy efficient office block that people, walk, cycle, and get public transport to, as the perfect energy saving scenario (ignoring the reality of everyone still wanting to work from home). An efficient block built in 2000, is hopelessly inefficient by todays requirements, and as such, most are being renovated at huge cost to meet carbon zero emissions. But, all these newer techs - solar panel windows (which makes A LOT of sense btw - particularly seeing as most office block exteriors are sheets of glass), battery charging floor panels (through vibrations) etc - have missed the boat. Not to mention their cost. In another 20 years when buildings renovate again - is it too late? And then there's personal homes - people get mortgages for a lifetime on existing properties. It's hard enough paying that. It like the internet - the speeds are there, but it takes decades to roll out full fiber to replace the existing network - only much, much more complex, as buildings are bogged down by long term, and lifetime contracts to old pre-existing energy in-efficient properties. I remember Tomorrow's World on the BBC talking about such energy efficient predictions in the future in the 80's. But going through life I see, that the problem has always seemed to be real world infrastructure and human society, rather than technology itself, that holds everything up. But otherwise, of course, I agree.
On another note altogether (and I do apologize in advance to the presenter if any way inappropriate - it's a compliment from my neck of the world!): what a fantastic Bond girl she would make! The look, the accent, the brains, a Russian born free thinker working on the importance of taking Europe away from Russian fuel dependence. There's even a current and relevant plot line in there too!

[jokerarthas]

"and it all starts with the government mandating"
And this how it stops as well. Unfortunately

[fatmayldrm]

Buildings are important not only as a building but also throughout life and it is an issue that needs attention.

[wonhur]

I am new to the stock market. Every stock that I bought so far, I was out of luck because I bought them when they were expensive. I feel I missed out on all the stock opportunities so far for the tech stocks.I believe having 175K yearly income would be a good investment so I want to plug all my savings into the stock market. I know this sounds a bit dull but I would like to know if I should learn investing or let somebody else (more capable like a FA) do it for me? Please share your thoughts. I am kind of tired of searching for a good stock to buy and losing all the good opportunities.

[mloney]

It’s all about who controls the energy algorithm…our current messed up system started when we put Govt in charge of energy distribution. Every house should be built with solar roofs, and wind turbines. You use what you collect and sell what you don’t need. Let nature teach us restraint and solidarity not our elected betters!

[meqhas]

Great talk, I like it. Has a lot of theories which are under research and application right now. Indeed, we need to rethink and redesign our building to make it more comfortable, more efficient and more sustainable. However, this way of thinking "the researcher's dream thinking" has a lot of inefficient thinking and I dea. Just imagine, at 4am, when the temperature is -40 degrees outside and the "intelligent grid decided there is a high demand on energy and we need to stop supplying heating water to some buildings. This way of thinking looks like Robin Hood's story, which tries to steal from the rich to feed the poors. However, the rich will never, accept their money to be stolen. If you do not get the idea, just rethink, all required technology relies on silicon chips. Silicon is rare in nature, and those chips, according to my knowledge, are not recyclable up to the moment.

[ASTERK]

what i really afraid of is that some bad hacking come from outside that interrupt the right data transferred to the system, will cause system error and result of long blackout

[aristarkh]

а як налаштувати захист в мережі, якщо постійно змінюється положення генеруючої гілки?

[funnytv-]

Sorry works when mistakes are made, But not when trust is broken. So in life, make mistakes but never break a trust.Because forgiving is easy, but forgetting and trusting again is sometimes impossible.

[Picci]

My house produces far more energy that we consume as a family. It's not difficult, technologies exist and are not crazy expensive.

[halthammerzeit]

Robert Silcerberg's Closed World novel tackles the topic. Mega buildings recycling everything, millions cramped, no family bonds and so on...

[hehheh]

they did. look at the old buildings built on leu lines with steeples and other fancy architectural aspects.

[piepkwiep]

A basalt heat battery can safe heat obtained in the summer for the winter.

[JS-dmsp]

"and it all starts with the govrnment mandating..."
if this is how the solution starts I have little hope

[lindaandrews]

Iv been saying Exactly This, re building storeing Energy .... for Decades

Thankyou 🙏 for finally addressing 🕉👍😎

[Brennbare]

Make all rooftops out of solar cells.
Roads too.

[PaulADAigle]

I've been pushing this for years, but I have no platform for it.