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Concept
Open Source Ecology
Summary
Open Source Ecology (OSE) is a network of farmers, engineers, architects and supporters, whose main goal is the eventual manufacturing of the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS). As described by Open Source Ecology "the GVCS is an open technological platform that allows for the easy fabrication of the 50 types of industrial machines that it takes to build a small civilization with modern comforts". Groups in Oberlin, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York and California are developing blueprints, and building prototypes in order to test them on the Factor e Farm in rural Missouri. 3D-Print.com reports that OSE has been experimenting with RepRap 3-D printers, as suggested by academics for sustainable development.
Marcin Jakubowski founded the group in 2003. In the final year of his doctoral thesis at the University of Wisconsin, he felt that his work was too closed off from the world's problems, and he wanted to go a different way. After graduation, he devoted himself entirely to OSE.
OSE made it to the world stage in 2011 when Jakubowski presented his Global Village Construction Set TED Talk. Soon, the GVCS won Make magazine's Green Project Contest. The Internet blogs Gizmodo and Grist produced detailed features on OSE. Jakubowski has since become a Shuttleworth Foundation Fellow (2012) and TED Senior Fellow (2012).
Open Source Ecology is also developing in Europe as OSE Germany. This is an independent effort based on OSE's principles.
In 2016, OSE and the Open Building Institute joined forces to make affordable, ecological housing widely accessible. The initiative has prototyped the Seed Eco-Home – a 1400 square foot home with the help of 50 people in a 5-day period – demonstrating that OSE's Extreme Manufacturing techniques can be apply to rapid swarm builds of large structures. Materials for the Seed Eco-Home cost around US50,000 in 2022 due to rising lumber prices . Further, OBI has prototyped the Aquaponic Greenhouse – which was also built in 5 days with 50 people.
Official source
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