Norman Foster :建造綠色環保的未來

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http://dotsub.com/view/6ae170c6-bf2f-4e7c-8fe8-49f9231dd9ca
Norman Foster :建造綠色環保的未來
身为一名建筑师， 你是利用对于过去的了解 来为现在设计， 也为基本未知的未来而设计 绿色议程也许是现在最重要的话题， 人们都关注的话题。 我想与大家分享一些经验 过去40年- 今年我们庆祝我们的40周年-- 一起来讨论和接触一些关于 持续的本质的观察。 你能预期多远，后面又会发生什么， 有哪些威胁，有哪些可能， 挑战与机会？ 我想-- 我曾经在很多年前提过， 那还是在绿色议程的概念都还没存在之前， 这不是为了时髦-- 是为了生存。
不过我从没说过， 但是现在我要强调的是， 环保是件非常有意义的事。 我的意思是，所有由环保概念引发的项目 都跟庆祝的生活方式有关， 那是庆祝决定生活质量的 地方和空间 我实际上很少引述任何东西， 如此，如果我能，我要找篇文章 去年年底有人曾提出过这个想法 关于个人怎么样的，作为一位重要的观察者， 分析家，作家，一个名叫汤姆士 弗里曼的人， 他2006年在国际先锋论坛。 他说， 我想在2006年，最重要的事件 就是让大家知道环保的概念。 今年，我们达到了一个引爆点 生活，拍戏，设计，投资和生产都被环保的概念影响。 大众都开始明白了 包括了市民，企业家和政府人员 他们能做得最爱国的，最资本主义的，最地理政治学 及最具有竞争性的事。 所以我的座右铭是：环保是新的红，白，蓝。“
回顾过去我问我自己， ”关注地球及其脆弱性是何时开始的呢？“ 我想是从1969年7月20日， 那是，第一次，人类回顾地球。 从某种程度上来说，是巴克明斯特 富勒创造了那个词。 在共产体制瓦解之前， 我荣幸地跟许多前苏联的宇航员 在俄国的太空城和其他地方见过。 很有趣的事情，我回想起来， 他们是第一批真正的环保主义者。 他们充满一种开拓者的热情， 为咸海的问题而充满热情。 那个时期-- 发生了几件事情。 巴克明斯特 富勒是那种环保领袖-- 这也是当时还未被创造出来的词汇。 他是个设计科学家，如果你想，也是一位诗人， 他预期了所有正在发生的事情。 --这是别的话题，另一段谈话。 你可以看看他的作品，很棒。 就在那时， 巴克的预言激起了关注，他身为 公民，地球的公民， 影响了我的思想及当时正在做的事情。
有几个项目。 我选了这个是因为它是在1973年， 为加那利群岛之一的总体计划。 这或许是个巧合 遇上地球原始资料， 以及嬉皮运动。 这个设计图上有一些那样的特性 来综合那些建议。 那些构成现在成为了 共同的说法，出现在我们的词汇中， 你知道，30多年之后。 风能，回收，生物能源，太阳能电池-- 同时还有 一个特别的设计俱乐部。 那些真正有设计意识的人们 深受迪特拉姆斯的作品的影响， 以及他为布劳恩公司所创造的 那些物品的影响。 这是在50年代、60年代中期的事了。 不论巴克预言 所有的东西都将小型化 而且科技将创造一种不可思议的风格-- 贴近舒适，实用-- 很难想象 我们在这张图上看到的一切 都将被包装得很时髦。 此外，它们将只有你的掌心大小。
我认为数字革命 发展到了现在这个阶段 可将许多人聚集在虚拟世界， 最终与现实世界联结的境地， 事实上这个联结已经被人性化了， 所以数字世界拥有亲切感， 即时性，以及模拟世界的方向。 也许可以用 时髦的或者能替代的来作个总结， 就像是我们被赋予享受午餐时间， Maxin*，一种更高级的发展， 再次，受到奇妙的感受所启发。 一个非常，非常漂亮的物品。 在50和60年代很独特的东西 有趣的是， 现在已经很普遍。 把iPod做为标志的参考， 和一种令人回味的表现方式，传达方式。 2007年初很有趣的是， 金融时报报道了底特律的几家公司 都羡慕丰田从 Prius获得的光环效应，即电油能混合汽车， Prius因此也成为跟iPod竞争的象征性产品。
我想我们很容易引诱自己， 无论是建筑师或者是参与设计过程的任何人， 都会认为解决问题的方法就在建筑上。 建筑物是重要的，但是 他们只是大景象中的一部分。 换句话说，我将试图说明， 如果你能做到不可能的事情， 例如永动机， 你就能设计一栋零碳房屋。 那将会是解决的方法。 可惜的是，那不是解决的方法。 只是问题的开始而已。 你不能将建筑物从 城市基础建设和交通运输中 分离出来。 例如，如果，用巴克启发我们的词汇，我们退后一步 来观察地球， 我们看到一个典型的，工业化的社会， 能源消耗是这样的分布的 建筑，44%，交通，34%，及工业。 但是再次地，这仅仅是整体的一部分。 如果你将建筑和交通一起来看 换句话说，人们的交通，也就是26%， 70%的能源消耗 则受到城市及其基础建设如何一起运作的影响。
于是持久性的问题 不能跟建筑所归属的城市的本质分开， 建筑是城市的一部分。 例如，你把两个城市作比较， 一个新的城市， 我说，简单点，一个北美的城市-- 底特律就行，大量地依赖汽车。 底特律城市以环状的方式扩散， 耗用更多的绿地， 更多的道路，更多的能源 消耗在人们往返市中心的交通中-- 这样，市中心，随着它不再是人们的 生活空间，仅仅作为商业中心，它也就死亡了。 如果你将底特律跟北欧的一个城市相比较， 慕尼黑算是不错的选择， 慕尼黑大量依赖走路和骑脚踏车， 那么这个密度多了一倍的城市， 却只使用底特律十分之一的能源。 换句话说，你看这些比较的例子 就知道能源的差距很大。
基本上，如果你想归纳，你可以说 在底线上随着人口密度的增加， 能源消耗却可大幅减少。 当然你无法撇开 社会多样性，公共交通 行走距离的可行性， 城市的空间品质等条件。 但是，你可以看到底特律，处于顶部的黄色部分， 有着惊人的消耗，哥本哈根则在其下。 哥本哈根，尽管是个人口密集的城市， 比起其他一些真正密集的城市却不算密集。 2000年，发生了一件相当有趣的事。 你第一次看到五百万人或以上的巨型城市， 开始在发展中国家形成。 现在，在46个典型城市中， 33个巨型城市都在发展中国家。 所以你会问自己-- 例如，中国或印度，会带来什么样的环境冲击。 如果你拿中国，或者只是北京做例子， 你看它的交通系统， 及能源消耗所导致的污染 当汽车变得跟自行车一样便宜。 换句话说，如果每天有1000辆汽车增加在路上， 这是正在发生的事情-- 数据显示这是世界上最蓬勃的汽车市场。 而三亿多人骑的五亿辆自行车正在减少。
这样的都市化速度真实惊人的快。 假如，我们思考自己社会的转变 从空地发展到城市整整花了200年的时间， 而同样的过程仅花了20年。 换句话讲，快了整整十倍。 非常有趣的是，大约60年间， 我们看到预期寿命增加了一倍， 同时都市化快了三倍。 如果我们看全球， 以相同的时间段来看 就科技这一工具而言， 科技是设计师的工具， 我将以我自己公司的经验作为例子， 选一些作品来说明-- 如何测量科技的改变程度？ 科技如何影响建筑物的设计？ 特别的事，它如何引领 我们创造节能的， 低污染的，具有更多社会责任的建筑物？
故事发生在60年代末，70年代初。 一个例子是一个企业的总部大楼 这个企业叫威利斯和法贝尔， 地点在英格兰东北部的商业小镇， 与伦敦距离不远。 首先你看见 这栋大楼的屋顶像是个 很温暖的大被子，一个隔热花园， 一个共享的公共空间。 换句话说，这个社区有个空中花园。 人性化的想法在这些作品中很浓重， 或许这也涵盖在我早期的手稿当中， 当你看到绿地，当你看到阳光， 你就跟自然有了接触。 自然是这栋建筑的发电机和驱动者之一。 象征性地，室内的颜色是绿色跟黄色的。 它还有游泳池等设施，有弹性工作时间， 有社交中心，还有一个空间，你能跟自然相处的空间。 那是1973年的设计。
2001年，这栋建筑得了个奖。 表彰一座使用了 很长一段时间的建筑。 建造它的人们聚集在一起： 项目主管，公司主席 他们说 那个建筑诺曼总是说 是为未来做设计的， 而且也没让我们花更多的钱。 所以，我们让他幽默一把，让他高兴。 上方的图片， 如果你仔细看， 其实它是告诉你，你可以为这栋建筑布线。 这栋建筑为了改变而布线。 1975年，图片上的是打字机。 当拍摄照片时，则变成了电脑。 他们都说，那个时侯是我们的竞争者 必须建造出适应新科技的大楼。 我们很幸运 因为我们的建筑适应了未来。 它预计了改变，甚至是那些不可知的改变。 大约是在完成这栋大楼的设计之前， 我花了张草图，最近才从档案中拿出来。 我在上面写着，“但是我们没有那个时间， 我们真的没有即时的专家 技术专家。”
换句话说，我们当时并没有相关的技术 能把真的有意思的东西建造出来。 比如创造一种立体泡泡-- 一种会自然通风的有趣外层， 会呼吸而且真能减少能量消耗。 尽管，事实上，这栋建筑也是一栋绿色建筑， 是绿色建筑的先锋。 如果我把时间条块，有趣的是 现在的技术可行而且值得庆祝。 去年落成的自由大学的图书馆， 就是一个例子。 从几万份草图中变成 计算机图再变成实体。 这里面混合着许多设备， 那些厚重的水泥书柜， 还有被外层包覆的方式 可让图书馆自然通风， 大量节能， 而且，还能够以大自然的方式运作。
有趣的是，这很受 使用者的喜爱。 这又将我们带回生活品味的观念上， 从某种程度上讲，人们都认同生态议题。 这不是一种牺牲，而是恰恰相反。 我认为环保是件很棒的事情，值得庆祝。 你能测量环保的功效 将这栋建筑的耗能量跟典型的图书馆 作比较。 让我举出另一项环保科技 在背景完全不同的地方-- 这栋建筑位于瑞士的阿尔卑斯山。 用最传统的建材预先打造， 材料--因为有科技和电脑的帮助， 可预制高性能的木材结构， 那是很先进的建材。 再来看一下这个技术， 将点划分在空中 再将信息传输到 工厂。
越过瑞士的边界--就越过一点点， 在德国有一间小工厂，你可以看到这里有个人站在电脑前， 刚才那些空中的点就传输过来了。 左边的是用来切割的机器 这样工厂 可以预制每一块独特的建材。 只留下非常小的尺寸让工人 现场组装。 有趣的是，接着那栋建筑将以 最古老的技术覆盖起来，那就是像手工切制的瓦片。 以手工铺上的25万瓦片来完成最后的表面处理。 再次，就建筑而言， 我们享受到了在那里居住 和参观的空间。 我跳到这里讲解这些新的技术， 那在此之前-发生了什么呢？ 我的意思是，在手机等你认为理所应当 的事物出现之前， 那样的生活有时什么样的呢？
当然，建筑还是盖起来了。 这是1979年建造的香港银行的内部， 在1985年落成，能够将阳光折射 进入这个空间的中心。 在没有电脑的情况下，你必须制作实体模型。 例如，我们将模型放在人造天空下。 对于风道，我们就真的把它 放在风道里吹， 应用几千米长的钢索等等。 对我们而言，转折点发生在 我们拥有了第一批电脑。 当时我们正在探索 重新设计机场。 这是希思罗机场的第四候机室，很典型的候机室。 很大、很重的屋顶，完全阻挡了阳光， 很多机器，大型管道，嘈杂的机械声。
斯坦斯德特，绿色的候机室， 采用自然光，是个很友善的空间-- 你知道你在那里，你也跟外界有联结。 整个循环的重点是，它不需要电灯-- 因为电灯会产生热量， 既而增加散热的负担。 就是那个特殊时刻 这是其中一台稀少的独立计算机。 那是斯坦斯德特机场的机构图。 1990年，不太久远的年代。 这是我们的办公室。 如果你仔细看，你会看到 你们用铅笔绘图， 他们还在用大尺子和三角板。 那并不是很久以前的事情，17年，看看我们现在。 真是巨大的转变。
回顾以前，有位叫韦拉瑞 拉肯*德女士， 1987年，她将所有的资料都存在一张磁盘上。 现在，每个星期我们的资料都相当于那时的八千四百万张， 存储了过去的， 现在的及将来的所有项目。 长度可达21千米，直达天空。 这是你从那个高度往下看的景象。 可是现在，你知道， 像戈尔那样的杰出倡导者 都在说气温将无法停止攀升， 在这样的情况下。 有趣的是，这些提倡 环保的建筑都跟那个地方关系密切。
我们柏林国会大厦的项目， 我想这是一个众所皆知的议题， 作为公共空间，我们想找办法 提倡环保的方式， 重新诠释社会及政治家的关系， 公共空间，也许在隐藏的议题中，有能源宣言-- 某种不需要，完完全全的不需要 燃料的东西。 利用完全可以再生能源。 再次，人性化的草图，转变成公共空间。 但是，这个生态环境的一部分。 但是，我们不需要实际制作的模型。 显然风道有它的地盘， 但是有了现在的电脑技术， 去探索，规划，和观察那将会如何 在自然力量下运行。 自然通风，我们能模拟地下的空间， 并探讨生物能源。 综合生物，地下蓄水层，燃烧植物油-- 这是一个东德设计的流程， 有趣的是 那个时候东德 还依靠着苏联。
我们用这项重新翻译过来的技术建成 干净的，几乎是零污染的能源。 你可以再测量一次。 你可以比较这栋建筑 每年的二氧化碳排量-- 在项目开始时是7000吨以上。 使用天然气后呢？ 最后使用植物油只有450吨。 减少了94%--几乎是零污染。 我们看到同样的设计， 在商业银行-- 依赖自然通风， 你可以模拟那些花园， 旋转的造型。 但是，又一次地，跟生活品味及品质有关-- 一个让人能够乐在其中的地方。 而且，我们也能测量其中的 节能功效。
在这些项目之间有场革命， 瑞士再保险公司有进一步推进了这种发展。 这是在伦敦的项目。 这一连串的图片将呈现模拟的过程。 它首先呈现的，我觉得很有趣， 是你现在看见的圆圈及圆圈周围的公共空间。 还有哪些方法， 能将同样大的空间放在那里呢？ 例如，你可以想盖一栋楼 以人行道为边界线， 可以造出同样大的空间。 最后，你描绘出一个轮廓，切除纹路。 那些纹路变成类似的绿色的肺 提供景色，光线，通风， 让建筑更新鲜。 然后，你用对外表也有装饰作用的东西， 将整栋建筑包起来， 那就是三角形的网状体-- 再次，与一些巴克明斯富勒的作品 跨越时空互相呼应， 而三角形的设计提高了性能， 也给与这栋建筑独特的身份识别。
如果我们仔细看 这栋建筑如何向上伸展， 现在利用电脑，我们可以模拟力度， 看到高气压，低气压， 建筑本身就像机翼一样运作。 它也有能力，在任何时候， 无论风向如何， 让建筑维持通风和高效能。 跟传统建筑不同的是， 建筑的顶端是一个庆祝室。 让人观景的地方，而不是机械室。 建筑的底层也是公共空间。 跟典型的建筑相比较， 如果我们尝试采用这样的设计策略， 并大规模的应用，将会发生些什么呢？ 我将分享两张公司调查计划的 图片。
大家都知道死海正在死亡。 海平面正在下降，有点像咸海。 死海的海平面显然 比周围的海洋低。 于是就出现了一个拯救死海的计划， 设置运输管线， 有时浮现，有时隐藏， 从阿卡巴湾输送水来填补 死海。 我们的想法是， 用过去40年来积累的知识， 如果不用输送管线， 而是创造一条生命线呢？ 假使这跟大运河一样 取决于所在的位置， 就观光客、居住环境、海水、农业来看? 换句话说，水就是生命。
如果回到刚才的图片， 你看到这个反复无常且敌对的地区， 一个将人道主义结合在一起的设计 很可能将敌对派聚集在一起， 为了共同的原因，在最广泛的意义上 是环保且有效的东西。 如此庞大的基础设施 也离不开沟通。 无论是在虚拟世界 还是在现实世界的沟通， 对社会来说都是中心。 在不断成长的世界里，我们如何更清楚地表达， 尤其是在我讨论过的一些地方-- 中国，在未来的10年 将会建设400个新机场。 那些机场会是什么样的呢？ 你如何让大规模的机场对环境更友善呢？
香港机场，我形容它是一个数字时代的类似体验 因为你总能有参考。 如果我们将这点延伸到中国社会， 又会发生些什么呢？ 有趣的是，结果将产生一个 最终极的巨型建筑。 这是目前地球上最大的项目。 250--抱歉，5万人每天工作24小时，一周工作7点。 比希思罗机场还要大17%，包括现有的 候机室以及未建盖的第五候机室。 这当中的挑战是要盖一栋绿色建筑， 尽管巨大，还要精简， 以人类的旅行体验为目标， 也强调友善的使用性，这又回到原点， 跟生活品味非常，非常的有关系。 也许，最后这将会是一个值得庆祝的空间。
如同休伯特*在午餐时谈到的， 我们那时的谈话， 说到环保，说到城市。 休伯特所说的完全正确，“这些都是新的大教堂。” 从某种程度上说，这段讲演的某一部分 是在除夕夜想到的， 当我说到中国的奥运议题， 它的绿色理想与抱负。 我说出了自己的想法-- 在那除夕夜想到的， 那好象是2006年到2007年转折的象征， 也许，未来是 最强大，创新的国家。 像肯尼迪那样说出启发性的话， “我们把人放到月球上去。”
谁会来说 我们突破了对石化燃料的依赖， 摆脱了流氓政权控制的价格等等， 这是个商议好的平台。 不只是一种装置，你知道的，它可以再生。 我说出一个想法，也许在进入新的一年时， 我认为这些启发性的想法很可能 会来自于其他，更大的国家-- 中国，印度，亚太的老虎们。 非常谢谢大家。
(掌声）


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Norman Foster's green agenda
As an architect you design for the present, with an awareness of the past, for a future which is essentially unknown. The Green Agenda is probably the most important agenda and issue of the day. And I'd like to share some experience. Over the last forty years -- we celebrate our 40th anniversary this year -- and to explore and to touch on some observations about the nature of sustainability. How far you can anticipate, what follows from it, what are the threats, what are the possibilities, the challenges, the opportunities? I think that -- I've said in the past, many, many years ago, before anybody even invented the concept of a Green Agenda, that it wasn't about fashion -- it was about survival.

But what I never said, and what I'm really going to make the point is, that really, green is cool. I mean, all the projects which have in some way been inspired by that agenda are about a celebratory lifestyle, In a way celebrating the places and the spaces which determine the quality of life. I rarely actually quote anything, so I'm going to try and find a piece of paper if I can, which somebody at the end of last year ventured the thought about what for that individual, as a kind of important observer, analyst, writer, a guy called Thomas Friedman, who wrote in the Herald Tribune about 2006. He said, "I think the most important thing to happen in 2006 was that living and thinking green hit Main Street. We reached a tipping point this year where living, acting, designing, investing and manufacturing green came to be understood by a critical mass of citizens, entrepreneurs and officials as the most patriotic, capitalistic, geo-political and competitive thing they could do. Hence my motto: green is the new red, white and blue."

And I asked myself, in a way, looking back, "When did that kind of awareness of the planet and its fragility first appear?" And I think it was July 20th, 1969, when, for the first time, man could look back at planet Earth. And in a way, it was Buckminster Fuller who coined that phrase. And before the kind of collapse of the communist system, I was privileged to meet a lot of cosmonauts in Space City and other places in Russia. And interestingly, as I think back, they were the first true environmentalists. They were filled with a kind of pioneering passion, fired about the problems of the Aral Sea. And at that period it was -- in a way, a number of things were happening. Buckminster Fuller was the kind of green guru -- again, a word that had not been coined. He was a design scientist, if you like, a poet, but he foresaw all the things that are happening now. And -- it's another subject, it's another conversation. You can go back to his writings, it's quite extraordinary. It was at that time, with an awareness fired by Bucky's prophecies, his concerns as a citizen, as a kind of citizen of the planet, that influenced my thinking and what we were doing at that time.

And it's a number of projects. I select this one because it was 1973 and it was a master plan for one of the Canary Islands. And this probably coincided with the time when you had the planet Earth's sourcebook, and you had the hippy movement. And there are some of those qualities in this drawing which seeks to sum up the recommendations. And all the components are there which are now in common parlance, in our vocabulary, you know, 30-odd years later. Wind energy, recycling, biomass, solar cells -- and in parallel at that time, there was a very kind of exclusive design club. People who were really design-conscious were inspired by the work of Dieter Rams, and the objects that he would create for the company called Braun. This is going back the mid '50s, '60s. And despite Bucky's prophecies that everything would be miniaturized and technology would make an incredible style -- access to comfort, to amenities -- it was very, very difficult to imagine that everything that we see in this image, would be very, very stylishly packaged. And that, and more besides, would be in the palm of your hand.

And I think that that digital revolution now is coming to the point where as the virtual world, which brings so many people together here, finally connects with the physical world, there is the reality that that has become humanized, so that digital world has all the friendliness, all the immediacy, the orientation of the analog world. Probably summed up in a way by the stylish or alternative available here, as we generously had gifted at lunchtime, the Maxin*, which is a further kind of development, and again, inspired by the incredible sort of sensual feel. A very, very beautiful object. So something which in [the] '50s, '60s was very exclusive has now become, interestingly, quite inclusive. And the reference to the iPod as iconic, and in a way evocative of performance, delivery. Quite interesting that the beginning of the year 2007, the Financial Times commented that the Detroit companies envy the halo effect that Toyota has gained from the Prius as the hybrid, energy-conscious vehicle, which rivals the iPod as an iconic product.

And I think it's very tempting to, in a way, seduce ourselves, and as architects, or anybody involved with the design process, that the answer to our problems lies with buildings. Buildings are important, but they're only a component of a much bigger picture. In other words, as I might seek to demonstrate, if you could achieve the impossible, the equivalent of perpetual motion, you could design a carbon-free house, for example. That would be the answer. Unfortunately, it's not the answer. It's only the beginning of the problem. You cannot separate the buildings out from the infrastructure of cites and the mobility of transit. For example, if, in that Bucky-inspired phrase, we draw back and we look at planet Earth, and we take a kind of typical, industrialized society, then the energy consumed would be split between the buildings, 44 percent, transport, 34 percent, and industry. But again, that only shows part of the picture. If you looked at the buildings together with the associated transport, in other words, the transport of people, which is 26 percent, then 70 percent of the energy consumption is influenced by the way that our cites and infrastructure work together.

So the problems of sustainability cannot be separated from the nature of the cities, of which the buildings are a part. For example, if you take, and you make a comparison between a recent kind of city, what I'll call, simplistically, a North American city -- and Detroit is not a bad example, it is very car dependent. The city goes out in annular rings, consuming more and more green space, and more and more roads, and more and more energy in the transport of people between the city center -- which again, the city center, as it becomes deprived of the living and just becomes commercial, again becomes dead. If you compared Detroit with a city of a Northern European example, and Munich is not a bad example of that, with the greater dependence on walking and cycling, then a city which is really only twice as dense, is only using one-tenth of the energy. In other words, you take these comparable examples and the energy leap is enormous.

So basically, if you wanted to generalize, you can demonstrate that as the density increases along the bottom there, that the energy consumed reduces dramatically. Of course you can't separate this out from issues like social diversity, mass transit, the ability to be able to walk a convenient distance, the quality of civic spaces. But again, you can see Detroit, in yellow at the top, extraordinary consumption, down below Copenhagen. And Copenhagen, although it's a dense city, is not dense compared with the really dense cities. And in the year 2000, a rather interesting thing happened. You had for the first time mega-cities, 5 million or more, which were occurring in the developing world. And now, out of typically 46 cities, 33 of those mega-cities are in the developing world. So you have to ask yourself -- the environmental impact of for example, China or India. If you take China, and you just take Beijing, you can see on that traffic system, and the pollution associated with the consumption of energy as the cars expand at the price of the bicycles. In other words, if you put onto the roads, as is currently happening, 1,000 new cars every day -- statistically it's the biggest booming auto market in the world. And the half-a-billion bicycles serving one-and-a-third billion people are reducing.

And that urbanization is extraordinary, accelerated pace. So, if we think of the transition in our society of the movement from the land to the cities, which took 200 years, then that same process is happening in 20 years. In other words, it is accelerating by a factor of 10. And quite interestingly, over something like a 60-year period, we're seeing the doubling in life-expectancy over that period where the urbanization has trebled. If I pull back from that global picture, and I look at the implication over a similar period of time in terms of the technology -- which as a tool is a tool for designers, and I cite our own experience as a company, and I just illustrate that by a small selection of projects -- then how do you measure that change of technology? How does it affect the design of buildings? And particularly, how can it lead to the creation of buildings which consume less energy, create less pollution and are more socially responsible?

That story, in terms of buildings, started in the late '60s, early '70s. The one example I take is a corporate headquarters for a company called Willis and Faber, in a small market town in the northeast of England, commuting distance with London. And here, the first thing you can see is that this building, the roof is a very warm kind of overcoat blanket, a kind of insulating garden, which is also about the celebration of public space. In other words, for this community they have this garden in the sky. So the humanistic ideal is very, very strong in all this work, encapsulated perhaps by one of my early sketches here, where you can see greenery, you can see sunlight, you have a connection with nature. And nature is part of the generator, the driver for this building. And symbolically, the colors of the interior are green and yellow. It has facilities like swimming pools, it has flex-time, it has a social heart, a space, you have contact with nature. Now this was 1973.

In 2001 this building received an award. And the award was about a celebration for a building which had been in use over a long period of time. And the people who'd created it came back: the project managers, the company chairmen then. And they were saying, you know, the architects, Norman was always going on about designing for the future, and you know, it didn't seem to cost us any more. So we humored him, we kept him happy. The image at the top, what it doesn't -- if you look at it in detail, really what it's just saying is you can wire this building. This building was wired for change. So in 1975, the image there is of typewriters. And when the photograph was taken, it's word processors. And what they were saying on this occasion was that our competitors had to build new buildings for the new technology. We were fortunate because in a way our building was future-proofed. It anticipated change, even though those changes were not known. Round about that design period leading up to this building, I did a sketch, which we pulled out of the archive recently. And I was saying, and I wrote, "But we don't have the time, and we really don't have the immediate expertise at a technical level."

In other words, we didn't have the technology to do what would be really interesting on that building. And that would be to create a kind of three-dimensional bubble -- a really interesting overcoat that would naturally ventilate, would breathe and would seriously reduce the energy loads. Notwithstanding the fact that the building, as a green building, is very much a pioneering building. And if I fast-forward in time, what is interesting is that the technology is now available and celebratory. The library of the Free University, which opened last year, is an example of that. And again, the transition from one of the many thousands of sketches and computer images to the reality. And a combination of devices here, the kind of heavy-mass concrete of these book stacks, and the way in which that is enclosed by this skin, which enables the building to be ventilated, to consume dramatically less energy, and where it's really working with the forces of nature.

And what is interesting is that this is hugely popular by the people who use it. Again, coming back to that thing about the lifestyle, and in a way, the ecological agenda is very much at one with the spirit. So it's not a kind of sacrifice, quite the reverse. I think it's a great. It's a celebration. And you can measure the performance in terms of energy consumption of that building against a typical library. If I show another aspect of that technology then, in a completely different context -- this apartment building in the Alps in Switzerland. Prefabricated from the most traditional of materials, but that material -- because of the technology, the computing ability, the ability to prefabricate, make high-performance components out of timber -- very much at the cutting edge. And just to give a sort of glimpse of that technology, the ability to plot points in the sky and to transmit, to transfer that information now, directly into the factory.

So if you cross the border -- just across the border, a small factory in Germany, and here you can see the guy with his computer screen, and those points in space are communicated. And on the left are the cutting machines which then, in the factory, enable those individual pieces to be fabricated. And plus or minus very, very few millimeters, to be slotted together on site. And then interestingly, that building to then be clad in the oldest technology, which is the kind of hand-cut shingles. One-quarter of a million of them applied by hand as the final finish. And again, the way in which that works as a building, for those of us who can enjoy the spaces to live and visit there. If I made the leap into these new technologies, then how did we -- what happened before that? I mean, you know, what was life like before the mobile phone, the things that you take for granted?

Well, obviously the building still happened. I mean, this is a glimpse of the interior of our Hong Kong bank of 1979, which opened in 1985, with the ability to be able to reflect sunlight deep into the heart of this space here. And in the absence of computers, you have to physically model. So for example, we would put models under an artificial sky. For wind tunnels, we would literally put them in a wind tunnel and blast air, and the many kilometers of cable and so on. And the turning point was probably in our terms when we had the first computer. And that was at the time that we sought to redesign, reinvent the airport. This is Terminal Four at Heathrow, typical of any terminal. Big, heavy roof, blocking out the sunlight, lots of machinery, big pipes, whirring machinery.

And Stanstead, the green alternative, which uses natural light, is a friendly place -- you know where you are, you can relate to the outside. And for a large part of its cycle, not needing electric light -- electric light, which in turn creates more heat, which creates more cooling loads and so on. And at that particular point in time this was one of the few solitary computers. And that's a little image of the tree of Stanstead. Not going back very far in time, 1990. That's our office. And if you looked very closely, you'd see that people were drawing with pencils, and they were pushing, you know, big rulers and triangles. It's not that long ago, 17 years, and here we are now. I mean, major transformation.

Going back in time, there was a lady called Valerie Larkin*, and in 1987, she had all our information on one disk. Now, every week, we have the equivalent of 84 million disks, which record our archival information on past, current and future projects. That reaches 21 kilometers into the sky. This is the view you would get if you looked down on that. But meanwhile, as you know, wonderful protagonists like Al Gore are noting the inexorable rise in temperature, set in the context of that. Interestingly, those buildings which are celebratory and very, very relevant to this place.

Our Reichstag project, which has a very familiar agenda, I'm sure, as a public place where we sought to, in a way, through a process of advocacy, reinterpret the relationship between society and politicians, public space, and maybe its hidden agenda, an energy manifesto -- something that would be free, completely free of fuel as we know it. So it would be totally renewable. And again, the humanistic sketch, the translation into the public space. But this very, very much a part of the ecology. But here, not having to model it for real. Obviously wind tunnel had a place, but the ability now with the computer to explore, to plan, to see how that would work in terms of the forces of nature. Natural ventilation, to be able to model the chamber below, and to look at biomass. A combination of biomass, aquifers, burning vegetable oil -- a process that, quite interestingly, was developed in Eastern Germany, at the time of its dependence on the Soviet Bloc.

So really, retranslating that technology and developing something which was so clean, it was virtually pollution-free. You can measure it again. You can compare how that building, in terms of its emission in tons of carbon dioxide per year -- at the time that we took that project, over 7,000 tons. What it would have been with natural gas? And finally with the vegetable oil, 450 tons. I mean, a 94 percent reduction -- virtually clean. We can see the same processes at work in terms of the Commerce Bank -- its dependence on natural ventilation, the way that you can model those gardens, the way they spiral around. But again, very much about the lifestyle, the quality -- something that would be more enjoyable as a place to work. And again, we can measure the reduction in terms of energy consumption.

There is an evolution here between the projects, and Swiss Re again develops that a little bit further. The project in the city in London. And this sequence shows the buildup of that model. But what it shows first, which I think is quite interesting, is that here you see the circle, you see the public space around it. What are the other ways of putting the same amount of space on the site? If, for example, you seek to do a building which goes right to the edge of the pavement, it's the same amount of space. And finally, you profile this, you cut grooves into it. The grooves become the kind of green lungs which give views, which give light, ventilation, make the building fresher. And you enclose that with something that also is central to its appearance, which is a mesh of triangulated structures -- again, in a long connection evocative of some of those works of Buckminster Fuller, and the way in which triangulation can increase performance and also give that building its sense of identity.

And here, if we look at a detail of the way that the building opens up and breathes into those atria, the way in which now, with a computer, we can model the forces, we can see the high pressure, the low pressure, the way in which the building behaves rather like an aircraft wing. So it also has the ability, all the time, regardless of the direction of the wind, to be able to make the building fresh and efficient. And unlike conventional buildings, the top of the building is celebratory. It's a viewing place for people, not machinery. And the base of the building is again about public space. Comparing it with a typical building, what happens if we seek to use such design strategies in terms of really large-scale thinking? And I'm just going to give two images out of a kind of company research project.

It's been well known that the Dead Sea is dying. The level is dropping, rather like the Aral Sea. And the Dead Sea is obviously much lower than the oceans and seas around it. So there has been a project which rescues the Dead Sea by creating a pipeline, a pipe, sometimes above the surface, sometimes buried, that will redress that, and will feed from the Gulf of Aqaba into the Dead Sea. And our translation of that, using a lot of the thinking built up over the 40 years, is to say, what if that, instead of being just a pipe, what if it is a lifeline? What if it is the equivalent, depending on where you are, of the Grand Canal, in terms of tourists, habitation, desalination, agriculture? In other words, water is the lifeblood.

And if you just go back to the previous image, and you look at this area of volatility and hostility, that a unifying design idea as a humanitarian gesture could have the affect of bringing all those warring factions together in a united cause, in terms of something that would be genuinely green and productive in the widest sense. Infrastructure at that large scale is also inseparable from communication. And whether that communication is the virtual world or it is the physical world, then it's absolutely central to society. And how do we make more legible in this growing world, especially in some of the places that I'm talking about -- China, for example, which in the next ten years will create 400 new airports. Now what form do they take? How do you make them more friendly at that scale?

Hong Kong I refer to as a kind of analog experience in a digital age because you always have a point of reference. So what happens when we take that and you expand that further into the Chinese society? And what is interesting is that that produces in a way perhaps the ultimate mega-building. It is physically the largest project on the planet at the moment. 250 -- excuse me, 50,000 people working 24 hours, seven days. Larger by 17 percent than every terminal put together at Heathrow built, plus the new, un-built Terminal Five. And the challenge here is a building that will be green, that is compact despite its size and is about the human experience of travel, is about friendly, is coming back to that starting point, is very, very much about the lifestyle. And perhaps these, in the end, as celebratory spaces.

As Hubert* was talking over lunch, as we sort of engaged in conversation, talked about this, talked about cities. Hubert was saying, absolutely correctly, "These are the new cathedrals." And in a way, one aspect of this conversation was triggered on New Year's Eve, when I was talking about the Olympic agenda in China in terms of its green ambitions and aspirations. And I was voicing the thought that -- it just crossed my mind that New Year's Eve, a sort of symbolic turning point as we move from 2006 to 2007, that maybe, you know, the future was the most powerful, innovative sort of nation. The way in which somebody like Kennedy inspirationally could say, "We put a man on the moon."

You know, who is going to say that we cracked this thing of the dependence on fossil fuels, with all that being held to ransom by rogue regimes, and so on. And that's a concerted platform. It's more than one device, you know, it's renewable. And I voiced the thought that maybe at the turn of the year, I thought that the inspiration was more likely to come from those other, larger countries out there -- the Chinas, the Indias, the Asian-Pacific tigers. Thank you very much.

(Applause)