BIOMIMICRY AND BIOMIMICRY INNOVATIONS FOR ENERGY SUSTAINABILITY

 

Biomimicry is a practice that learns from and mimics the strategies found in nature to the invention of healthier, more sustainable technologies for people. According to the Biomimicry Institute, Biomimicry can be defined as “an approach to innovation that seeks sustainable solutions to human challenges by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and strategies.” Janine Benyus is the co-founder of the Biomimicry Institute.

According to the Janine Benyus, Biomimicry sees nature as: A model - It studies nature’s models and imitates them or uses them as inspiration for designs or processes with the goal of solving human problems; A measure - It uses ecological standards to judge the rightness of human innovations; A mentor - It is a new way of observing, assessing and valuing nature. To build a more life-friendly world one in which human technologies meet the same design constraints’ that the rest of life on Earth works within, is the purpose of biomimicry.

To achieve the biomimicry approaches, there are three levels of mimicry. They are Organism level, Behavior level and Ecosystem level. Organism level is referred to mimicking a specified organism how it functions; It could be the entire organism or a portion of the organism. Behavior level is involves the mimicry of how an organism interacts with its immediate environment in order to build a structure that can fit in without resistance in its surrounding environment. Ecosystem level is referred to mimicking a specific ecosystem and how it functions successfully as well as understanding what elements and principles are required for it to function successfully.

Energy is the key factor that enables the modern society. Energy demand will increase in coming decades. If new technologies could harvest energy in a sustainable way there would be no issues associated to the increasing trend in global energy demands. As well as, there are several causes leads to find a sustainable energy solution. Burning fossil fuels cause environmental pollution. Current energy distribution is one-way with power flowing from large suppliers to final consumers, and is outdated. Current systems are fails to meet the energy and environmental demands of society. For the future we need an increasingly efficient, active, and responsive energy network. Looking at nature, we can find sustainable energy solutions called Bio-inspired energy: Biomimicry innovations for energy sustainability.

Biomimicry use to create more efficient energy production, energy storage and energy delivery with innovations that replicate the designs of natural systems.

Nature inspired energy systems,

Artificial photosynthesis

·       Artificial photosynthesis is a chemical process that biomimics the natural process of photosynthesis to convert sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide into carbohydrates and oxygen.

·       Artificial leaf - Photocatalytic water splitting, converts water into hydrogen ions and oxygen.H₂ as liquid fuel

Tidal power system

·       This tidal power system mimics the uniform swimming patterns of fish like tuna, mackerel and sharks.

·       bioWAVE units mimic seaweed to create  energy from the motion of the waves

Wind turbine planning

·       By mimicking the characteristics of whales fins, tails and flippers, engineers have been able to design more efficient wind turbines.

Black butterfly wing solar collection structure

·       Wings have holes to capture light more effectively

Heliostat positioning for solar plants from sunflowers

·       By rearranging the mirrors in a sunflower-like spiral pattern with each mirror angled about 137⁰ relative to its neighbor, the footprint of the mirrors was reduced by 20 % while increasing the plant's potential energy generation.

        Written by

          Thilanka Sankalpa

          Undergraduate, Department of Civil and Environmental Technology,

          University of Sri Jayewardenepura.