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On the other hand, how can I encourage, debate or support others to reduce their emissions without being willing to act and experience the process myself.

Homo erectus, our earlier cousin, could do all these things and spread out globally surviving and developing for a million years.Interestingly, Homo sapiens, us, developing later and in parallel were a bit smaller.

The current view is that the advantage was size and reduced testosterone leading to less aggression and the ability to create and work in large social groups.. Mammals, themselves really came into their own after the last mass-extinction event some 65 million years ago.They were overall much smaller than the dominant animals - the dinosaurs - and their size and adaptability is seen as a key feature for their survival and thriving.. Moving away from the natural world into the world designed by Homo sapiens, there is a very different approach to scale.Things are scaled up and down from the size of a human.

Houses and buildings are sized to wrap around humans and floor heights set to allow humans to walk upright.The first factories were simply extensions on houses and the machines and equipment were generally sized to fit into slightly large rooms.

Of course, technology has pushed these boundaries to some degree and there are now large process plants like refineries or mega-factories..

The railway system of the world is scaled around the size of a horse and cart as that was the predominant transport technology when they came into existence.. Moving down in scale, we scale craft and industrial laboratory equipment so that humans can interact with it using their hands.. Evolution is an excellent process to improve and adapt size and function to meet the demands of survival.When coupled with building mounted renewables, it can deliver low to non-existent energy bills to occupants, with some designs capable of being cost negative over the course of the year..

Excellent Occupant Experience: Both Passivhaus and Bryden Wood believe that environmental performance should not come at the expense of occupant experience.This is reflected in the designs targeting both the Passivhaus Thermal Comfort criterion as well as CIBSE TM 59, which ensures adequate thermal performance.. Resilient and adaptable to different climate conditions: Passivhaus also provides additional resilience by adopting a design based on passive design strategies coupled with technological solutions that can easily be upgraded, refurbished and replaced.

Whilst Passivhaus was originally developed for residential buildings in Germany, the standard and its principles can be adopted in all kinds of building types, locations and climatic scenarios, and respond to the effects of global warming..However, there are four important challenges for the adoption of Passivhaus:.