Battle McCarthy Consulting Engineers (a London based office) leeds holistic engineering design teams covering all building and infrastructure design with priority of integrating the design process. One of the projects the office recently has been working on is an urban design for the Potsdammerplatz in Berlin.
Guy
Battle gave the following explanation at the design (with Alsop & Störmer):
"Like a cold-blooded reptile which raises it's scales to warm Itself in
the sun and finds a shady rock when it needs to cool down, so our buildings
need to be responsive and intelligent rather than inactive and dumb."
While the warm-blooded get their energy from large amounts of food, the cold-blooded generate a large part of their energy from their direct environment. Buildings could make more use of this principal, according to Guy Battle. Instead of the enormous energy consumption that is needed to keep installations running, buildings should make smart use of the free energy from their direct environment or from their users. Buildings that warm themselves from the sun and whose cover breaths.
jv