Ecological Building

Ecological Building
An Ecological Building is a structure that is designed to create and sustain mutually beneficial relationships with all of the elements of its local ecology. A building's local ecology, or environment, is made up of particular physical and biological elements and their interactions.
The abiotic, or physical elements are defined by the local geology and the local climate. The local geology is defined by the soil type, substrata, local land use, and water patterns of the site and its surroundings. The local climate is made up of the weather patterns, wind patterns, solar patterns, and pollution patterns for the site and its surroundings. The biotic or living elements are all of the local species and local ecosystems - including humans and urban ecologies - that interact with the site.This concept is distinctly different from green building, or sustainable architecture where the goal is to "minimize the negative environmental impact of buildings". Ecological building is a positive design goal that sets out to increase beneficial interactions, whereas green building is a negative design outlook that seeks only the reduction of negative interactions. Inherent in green building is the assumption that any human interaction with a site is unavoidably negative, and that mitigating these negative impacts is the best that is possible. With Ecological Building, the designer acknowledges that humans can play an integral, beneficial role in improving and sustaining the health and vitality of their local

Biogas Plant - Waste Water Treatment and Renewable Energy
The biogas plant on campus was completed in January 2005 [4]. Its location is next to the new cafeteria and the sanitary block, which are the main “waste” providers and biogas users. Since the decentralised sanitary concept suggests a separation of different flow streams of waste water such as urine, grey and black water, the process can be optimized and at the same time the size of the biogas digesters can be reduced.The simple and robust dome system is a continuous flow plant. Several have been built in Ghana with Ghanaian engineers by local companies. Within the research project, the solid and liquid matters, after a certain treatment time, will be analysed and tested on their suitability as fertiliser for agriculture. Black water of the sanitary facilities is treated anaerobic in the biogas digester together with organic waste from kitchen and farms. Biogas is the product of putrefaction bacteria that can biologically degrade organic material under anaerobic conditions (i.e. under sealed conditions without air). The biogas is collected in a PE sack and used for cooking in the cafeteria. The sludge on the ground of the digester can be used as fertiliser in agricultural areas of the campus. The outflow of the digesters discharge into three expansion chambers. From here the treated waste water goes into a septic tank where the wastewater is treated again. From the last filtration chamber purified water is pumped into an elevated tank and used under gravity for irrigation and as fertiliser on the farmland. The main purpose of the digesters is the treatment of black water. The production of biogas is just a secondary benefit.

Saving Energy by Solar Collectors
Solar energy is available all year round in Ghana, almost without interruption. The use of solar energy was examined with a simple solar collector for the new cafeteria. The viability of solar energy depends partly on the global development of energy prices. But, regardless of energy prices, such systems are more economical when one installation serves several parties rather than lots of individual systems. The use of a thermo-siphon plant is proposed after the testing phase for buildings with a large demand for hot water such as student hostels and cafeteria. These compact and economical plants work in a closed cycle utilising gravity rather than a pump and circulation controlling.

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