What does the earth look like from the window of an airplane?

I took the picture at the top of this page on a flight from Wisconsin to New York.

Looking out the window, I noticed something that had always been there, but for me was hiding in plain sight.

I recognized the scale at which human activities have reshaped the landscape.

It may sound silly, and certainly reveals a lack of awareness, but until that flight I had never really considered what preceded the unending farmlands of the Midwest. I guess I sort of assumed it was grasslands and prairie that was transformed into the immense expanses of agriculture we’re so accustomed to today.

And acre after acre of grassland being converted into acre after acre of corn never struck me as such a big deal — at least in comparison with some of the more drastic ecological transformations currently taking place. I thought the only real problems, on a scale that deserved immediate and serious attention, were things like the deforestation eating away the rainforest in Brazil or the pollution poisoning the land and water in China.

I mean, how many species really occupy a square mile of grassland? My assumption was, not that many. Certainly fewer than the number that occupy a square mile of rainforest. Therefore, it didn’t seem like we were sacrificing much in order to repurpose the land for agriculture.

Not to mention, growing up in America there’s an ingrained adoration of the Midwest farm. It’s as much a part of our culture as football, pickup trucks or eating turkey on Thanksgiving, which I’d say predisposed me to thinking about farms with a sort of default fondness.

However, the peppering of small sections of dark green in the bottom half of the picture — and the larger expanse of dark green in the top middle — reveal what was on this land before the farms.

It wasn’t grassland; it was forest.

The dark green sections stand out because they’re the only pockets of trees that are left.

Soaking in this view, it became apparent to me that the United States is no stranger to deforestation on an immense scale. Despite much of it taking place many years ago, the fact still remains that the forest (and all the creatures that lived in it) was cleared out to make way for those farms.

This isn’t necessarily to say that forests are inherently more valuable from an ecological standpoint than grasslands, but there is certainly more of a visual difference in the landscape when tree cover is lost.

And that contrast left an impression on me, causing me to pay more attention to the impact of human activities on natural habitats.

I caught myself noticing the same kind of thing all over the place. Almost like after you buy a car and suddenly start to see that same model everywhere on the road.

It didn’t take long to realize where we’re headed if we stay on our current trajectory.

We’re marching towards a world where civilization dominates, very little “wild” areas remain and most of the biodiversity is gone. A world of humans, crops and livestock, but not much else.

I’m sure you’ve heard people talk about humans colonizing Mars. Part of that vision usually assumes that, over time, we can terraform the planet. If you’re not familiar with that term, essentially what it means is that we can transform Mars from a dead and barren desert into a new Garden of Eden, with similar plant and animal life to what we have here on Earth.

Unfortunately, we are going in the opposite direction with Earth.

It was a Garden of Eden and we are ruining it.

Common Ground

Before going any further on this, let me take a moment to remind you that “we’re all on the same team” when it comes to protecting the habitats where plants and animals of all types thrive.

I realize “the environment” and “conservation” are topics of public discussion and debate that carry with them quite a lot of baggage. It’s certainly not lost on me that mere interest in these issues can be interpreted as an indicator of one’s broader political leanings.

However, I don’t believe this topic needs to be nearly as divisive as it seems to have become. To anticipate and address a common concern with environmental conservation, nowhere in this post will you find me arguing for “regulations that hurt businesses”.

What I’m going to propose is action that can be taken at an individual level - without waiting for the slow moving machinery of governments or corporations.

And the goal is simple — offer a way of continuing to enjoy the conveniences of modern life while disrupting nature as little as possible.

So, let’s establish a baseline I believe everyone can agree on.

I doubt it’s too presumptuous to say we all share a desire for places like this to exist:

Unfortunately however, the reality is that places like those are being turned into places like these at a rapid (and accelerating) pace:

It’s simple, there are roughly 15 billion acres of habitable land on the Earth and now over 7 billion people.

That breaks down to only 2 acres of land per person. And those two acres need to support us in ways we rarely consider. They wont only be used for housing, but also for farming and ranching to grow the food we eat, forestry to supply the timber to build our homes, mining to produce the raw materials we need to make products, factories to transform it all into final goods, retail for the stores we buy them at, etc…

And right now, all of the things I just mentioned are accomplished in ways that come at a direct cost to the environment.

When you take a minute to think about everything that goes into creating the type of life we enjoy in a place like the United States, it becomes much easier to visualize how our impact on the environment extends far outside the small plot of land our home sits on.

And if you look at other parts of the world, much of the population is still relatively poor, living modestly and requiring far fewer resources. However, most “developing” countries are making progress towards shedding that title quickly — just look at China. In the not-so-distant future, as the other 6 billion humans achieve a living standard similar to a middle class life in Europe or North America, we’ll continue dialing up our impact on the planet in order to provide that “better life” to all of them as well. And the pristine natural environments that are still left today will really be in trouble.

So unless we evolve the model of what it looks like to live a better life, we’re going to end up steamrolling nature all over the planet… in the name of progress.

That’s something I don’t want to see happen. And I know I’m not alone.

I’d bet most people share a desire for all the amazing life you’d see on a show like Planet Earth to still be around in a hundred years.

However, the only way to prevent pushing all those plants and animals to the brink of extinction — is to make sure they continue to have a home.

Whether you’re a Democrat or Republican, liberal or conservative, I’d be surprised if many people actually want to live on a fully industrialized planet.

That is where I think it’s easy to find common ground.

Summarizing the Problem

1. There are a whole lot more people living on planet Earth today than there ever was in the past, and the number is continuing to rise.

2. Living standards are going up all over the world meaning people are eating more food, buying more stuff and building bigger homes.

3. Because of 1 and 2, we’re accelerating the rate at which we’re destroying natural habitats.

4. If we continue on this trend, species extinction will accelerate and the diversity of life on this planet will plummet.

Many people are aware of coral bleaching — a phenomenon that is devastating not only to the coral, but to all the marine life that call the coral reef home.

I think it’s fair to borrow that terminology and broaden the scope to describe what’s happening in just about every corner of the planet — a phenomenon I’ll call “planetary bleaching”.

Planetary bleaching is the elimination of natural habitats due to human activity.

In the case of coral, they’re actually turning white, hence “bleaching”. In the broader sense, bleaching communicates more of a reductionism. Where there was once a forest teeming with diverse life, now stands only crops, grass, or concrete.

And while deforestation is one part of it, it’s not the only type of ecosystem we’re losing. Additionally, while the term invokes scenes of trees being chopped down, it fails to remind us that the animals who lived in the forest have been lost as well.

I just don’t think the term is particularly effective, it’s too esoteric. I think in most people’s minds it’s something happening somewhere else.

For example, even if your subdivision used to be a forest or your grandparents farm used to be a forest, that simple fact may not ever occur to you.

The term planetary bleaching is different because once you know what it is, you’re reminded of it every day by what you see. Crops, grass and concrete become self evident red flags of the unfortunate bleaching that has already taken place.

More Meta Problems

If you’re bought in to the idea that we should make at least some effort towards environmental preservation, there are actually quite a few areas that need to be addressed in parallel.

Here’s a quick summary of a few that I have a basic familiarity with:

• food (fruits and vegetables) — Millions of acres are being bleached of all but one form of life (a single crop). Vertical / hydroponic farming could help us produce far more (and higher quality) food using far fewer resources and zero pesticides. Imagine a skyscraper where each floor is full of plants, that’s quite a lot more broccoli and kale than you can grow by clearing an acre of forest and growing those crops in the ground.

• food (meats) — An immense amount of resources are needed to raise and slaughter animals. That livestock also represents a significant portion of greenhouse gas emissions. Cultured meat and meat substitutes are promising opportunities to drastically reduce the resources required, emissions emitted and suffering inflicted by current practices.

• energy — This is one that’s already part of the public conversation. We need to find ways of reducing the climate change effects of fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas. Renewables have been surging in popularity worldwide and nuclear has become a cornerstone of a few national energy portfolios. Together, these are already delivering a meaningful reduction of emissions, but we still have a long way to go.

• waste — Recent advancements have made it possible to automate waste sorting to direct far more of it into the recycling stream. This technology can divert a substantial amount of waste away from landfills or incineration, reducing both the volume of pollution and the need to collect more virgin raw material (which often requires destroying habitats in the process). We can also design products using materials that are non-toxic and readily degrade after use, drastically curtailing the potential for pollution in the first place.

• construction (cities) — There’s just no getting around the fact that cities completely eradicate everything that was there before them. Sure there are a few trees and ponds left in city parks, but the creatures that lived there are gone; those spaces are for human benefit. It’s impractical to think we can have deer, bears or alligators(!) running around a downtown area, but we can continue building taller so that more people fit on the same amount of land, curtailing sprawl.

All of these domains are important and worthy areas of focus. However, the project at the heart of this post will focus on another area: construction (suburban & rural).

Every Square Foot Comes At a Cost

I introduced the post by focusing on the environmental impact of farming.

Now I’d like to shift gears and bring things a little closer to home. Let’s take a look at the impact of suburbia.

In America and most other countries around the world, one of the fairly standard goals in life is to settle down and buy a house on some land where you can raise a family. The bigger the house, the better.

What I believe doesn’t garner enough appreciation however, is that every square foot of land dedicated to a traditional house and yard is one less square foot of whatever was there before construction started. And, ultimately, also one less square foot of home to every other species besides humans, pets, grass and garden plants.

It’s simply a fact that the same land area used as a concrete 3 car driveway is land that can’t be home to a tree, the birds that would be living in it and vines that would be growing on it. Similarly, by definition the land area used as a manicured lawn is land that can’t be home to wild bushes and the critters that would feed on its berries.

Farmland and suburbia are simply different sides of the same coin. We move into an area, strip everything away and use the land in often uninspired ways.

The way we’ve been going, humans are winning a zero sum game against everything else that lives on the planet.

Which is all to say the classic house with a grass yard and picket fence is itself a problem.

But, while many people have connected the dots between gas guzzling automobiles and climate change, the same connection has not been made (or at least not to the same degree) between suburban sprawl and its impact on the habitats of plants and animals that used to call that land home.

It seems like even the most environmentally conscious people out there think they’re doing their part to “save the planet” if they simply make some effort to recycle and buy an electric vehicle.

The fact that:

• the places we live

• the places we work

• the places we visit in our spare time (malls, bars, sports stadiums)

• and even the ways we get around (roads and highways)

were all constructed at the expense of the habitats that preceded them doesn’t seem to be recognized whatsoever.

Unfortunately, while recycling will hopefully make sure one’s plastic trash doesn’t end up in the ocean and buying an electric car will help bring down one’s carbon footprint, neither does much to solve the problem of habitat loss (and ultimately species extinction).

Which brings me to another inconvenient truth… suburbia is a perfect example of planetary bleaching.

That’s what I’d like to bring attention to and do something about.

It Shouldn’t Be a Sacrifice

Let’s say, at least at a high level, that you agree — though you do have some lingering reservations about practicality.

Instead of living in a house like the one pictured earlier, to leave the natural habitats intact am I supposed to pitch a tent and bathe in a stream? Will doing the environmentally friendly thing mean sacrificing luxuries and comfort?

No.

First of all, I believe if we actually want to see widespread change, we can’t rely on people making sacrifices in order to get us there. This is something environmentalists get wrong all the time. People will never make sacrifices on a large enough scale to make a big difference. Just as importantly though, a step forward for nature shouldn’t mean a step back for us.

If we want people to change their behavior in a way that helps us realize the goal of environmental conservation, we can’t expect to pressure them into sacrifice, we need to entice them with a better alternative.

Take Tesla as an example. Whatever else you may think of the company, if you respect hard work, competition and achievement, you have to be in awe with what that team has accomplished. After only 17 years in business, they’ve created a company the market has decided is the most valuable automaker in the world.

And what they’ve been working towards, their stated mission, is to “accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy”.

You may not remember it now, but only a few short years ago public sentiment was not kind to the electric vehicle. Practically everybody found the idea of an electric car to be ridiculous, and the people working on EVs were seen as misguided dreamers. Yet despite all the headwinds, Tesla was able to gain real traction with the Model S because it was superior to everything else on the market in a handful of very compelling ways.

1. Being electric, it was a zero emission vehicle — aka. much better for the environment to operate.

2. You could drive it across the country for free using their supercharging network — which is cheaper than filling up for gas at any price per gallon.

3. It was quicker than a Ferrari — kicking the stigma that electric cars were just glorified golf carts.

4. It was safer than a Volvo — highest crash test rating ever given.

5. It had tons of storage because of the front trunk — even more than many midsize SUVs.

6. Last, but certainly not least, it was the smartest car you could buy. Not only did it have a touch screen as big as your torso, but it also got updates more often than your smartphone.

With advantages like these, people took notice, and it’s no wonder the Model S went on to earn awards like Motor Trend Car of the Year.

Why did the Model S catch on when other attempts at electric cars did not?

The electric car challenges an assumption that pretty much everyone took for granted — that fossil fuels were the best energy source for automobiles.

And it’s very, very, very difficult to challenge what someone takes for granted. Because of this, simply dropping an electric motor into a vehicle people were already familiar with was never going to be enough.

But the Tesla team was able to create something new that proved electric vehicles could not just match, but be much better than gasoline vehicles in ways that actually mattered to people — not despite the fact that they were electric, but because they were electric.

Just as importantly though, they got people excited about an automotive revolution because their product was very clearly part of the solution to the climate change problem.

Breakdown

If there’s any chance of sparking a similar revolution in architecture, there needs to be something to rally around in the same way.

1. a superior product (that is better in ways that actually matter to people)

2. and something people can get excited about (because it’s a part of the solution to a big problem)

However, unlike the automotive revolution where one company became the standard bearer for electrification, I don’t think we’ll see a single company lead an architectural revolution with the same level of prominence.

Automotive production is highly centralized and there are monumental barriers to entry. Tesla was able to pull together enough resources to ramp up production and become a competitor on a global scale. But that’s rare, which is why there are so few new car brands.

Architecture, on the other hand, is incredibly diversified and the barriers to entry are very low. In advanced countries, anybody can take out the loans needed to get a degree in architecture and start producing designs. In some parts of the world, the formality of a professional architect with precise designs is not even part of the equation. People just jump straight into construction using designs that exist only in their head.

If an architectural revolution is going to happen, I think it’ll be because a style captures peoples hearts and minds and is implemented in many different ways all over the world.

This project showcases a style I’m calling Wild Architecture, which I hope will take hold in construction the way electrification is taking hold in transportation.

Wild Architecture

What is it?

Wild Architecture is an architecture style focused on preserving the wild by existing alongside native plants and animals, not instead of them. The objective is to minimize the impact to the natural habitat of the building site.

Whatever would have lived in the area if humans were not around should still be living there after we move in.

To accomplish this, our structures should sit as lightly as possible on the land.

Each wild architecture home delivers a direct environmental benefit to its specific plot of land, but the impact of the architecture will hopefully reverberate far beyond those boundaries. Living in this type of home is an ever present reminder of your values, and coming home to a space where the natural world has been preserved or restored will strengthen a mindset that will likely spillover into many other aspects of life as well.

And since minimizing impact is a quantifiable thing, there’s a metric that goes hand in hand with Wild Architecture.

Structures built in this style can be evaluated and assigned a “footprint score”. The baseline is 0. The more the structure takes away from the site’s capacity for biodiverse life, the greater the footprint and higher the score (high scores are bad).

The exact criteria and rules for the scoring system has not been worked out yet (I’ll flush that out soon), but I think it’s important for there to be a simple metric that will encourage people to improve their designs in ways that lessen the impact of what they decide to build.

Gamification, you could say, of an architecture style.

Setting Expectations

I’m having a hard time imagining what kind of home could leave nature intact and be better than this at the same time.

That’s the million dollar question and where the real challenge begins.

But before we get there, we must confront an unavoidable question looming over this whole thing: Do people enjoy being surrounded by nature?

The hope that we can shift the way we design and build our homes in a way that strikes a harmonious balance hinges on an assumption — that people enjoy being surrounded by nature.

If that’s not true for enough people, or maybe people only enjoy nature occasionally, and they’d much rather cut down the forest to make way for a traditional home and manicured lawn, then reigning in the environmental destruction caused by our homes is never going to happen. We’ll just continue building in the same way, steamrolling over millions of acres of land as the standard of living rises for billions of people.

What We Want (I Hope)

Let me tell you why I think people do enjoy being surrounded by nature — enough to choose that their home be surrounded by a forest instead of a lawn.

Consider a time you left the city or suburbs and went out of town to spend time in nature. There’s one feeling I bet you can relate to. It’s a of blend of excitement, bliss and relaxation that you get when you breathe in the fresh air and look out into the trees.

It really is soothing to see plant life in every direction, and a walk is more interesting when you see a family of deer.

We need to change the way we perceive nature. Instead of an adversary to be conquered, we need to view it as a friend whose company we enjoy.

Why is a manicured lawn better than the forest that was there before it? Why not have a yard full to trees and bushes and deer and squirrels?

Why do our homes need to be imposing structures, isolated by moats of grass and concrete? Why can’t they be designed to maximize our comfort and minimize their impact?

We’ve become accustomed to putting nature at arms reach. The solution lies in lowering our guard. By embracing the wild we can enrich our lives and allow the rest of nature to continue living theirs.

We can take an active role in preserving this wonderful planet, and it starts at home.

Think of your yard as your own personal nature reserve.

These are a handful of houses that already exist and illustrate what the exciting new frontier of Wild Architecture might look like.