Coming Soon
PROFESSIONAL CONTINUING EDUCATION AIA COURSES FOR ONE HOUR CREDIT:
WATER METRICS FLUENCY:
The learning objective of the course module is to provide students a foundation in water metrics and illustrate how they are used and discussed by the UN, media, and utility companies. Students will learn conversions for acre-feet to gallons, research size of lakes and reservoirs in your region versus globally, research size of significant aquifers in your region versus globally, and become familiar with online resources on statistical per capita water needed per day. Course will cover matching water reserve quantities to populations and correlating quantities of water needed for various population sizes.
Practical exercises: Create a spreadsheet sheet of 1) water inventory in your region matched with population, to calculate either abundance or shortage 2) another region to compare per capita water reserves.
WATER “FACTORS OF SAFETY”:
The learning objective of the course module is the ability to perform calculations for water “factors of safety” that can be applied to evaporation, transpiration, drought, leaks and accidents, system maintenance, and population increases (in the case of guests or refugees), etc. When engineers of any discipline use the term “factor of safety”, they mean to take into account the risk factors ahead of time, to assure that in an extreme scenario, there will be enough of a given resource.
Practical exercises: Cistern sizing, open-pond sizing, and closed-loop contained covered greenhouse bio-cell reservoir sizing.
WATER LOSS TROUBLE SHOOTING and MITIGATION:
The learning objective of the course module is a practical understanding of storing water within a closed loop water system, so that it can be reclaimed and reused. This course is taught from the perspective of industrial permaculture, in that every seeming waste flow is a resource for another use.
Practical exercises: 1) Review the percentages and quantities that typically escape from drips, leaky toilets, inefficient appliances, pipe breaks, irrigation timers, unnecessarily thirsty landscaping, steam, condensation, evaporation, transpiration, and percolation. 2) Design systems that mitigate these losses with redundant features in the infrastructure.
DOMESTIC RESIDENTIAL WATER DEMANDS:
The learning objective of the course module is to equip students with an in-depth break down of daily/monthly/annual domestic water demand activities including drinking, bathing, food prep and dishwashing, laundry, toilets, cleaning, non-edible landscaping, commerce, and edible agriculture, from rural low-income communities to five- star custom residential homes.
Practical exercises: 1) Create water budgets for a single family versus a town. 2) Student will create an additional practical assignment related to domestic residential water demands.
NONRESIDENTIAL WATER DEMANDS:
The learning objective of the course module is to introduce and compare water usage of common commercial and residential areas including offices, food and beverage service, Laundromats, power plants, big box stores, warehouses, manufacturing, schools, hospitals, and the construction industry.
Practical exercises: 1) Create an annual spread sheet of water usage for the business you work in or are familiar with. 2) Contribute findings to TheBlueArchitect.org database and discuss how wastewater from one business could be reclaimed and used by another.
EMBODIED WATER IN FOOD:
The learning objective of the course module is an understanding of the water needed for different kinds of herbs, vegetables, orchards, grains, and dairy, in tropical, temperate, and arid climates.
Practical exercises: 1) Calculate the annual water quantity needed for three food crops your household eats regularly, quantify how many acres are needed to produce that food, and the embodied water per meal. 2) Identify which foods could alternatively be grown/eaten that have lees embodied water.
EMBODIED WATER IN CONSUMER PRODUCTS:
The learning objective of the course module is to acquaint students with embodied water in our consumer choices.
Practical exercises: 1) Choose 10 different items in your house or office and calculate the embodied water for those generic items. 2) Compare two different brands for each for the 10 items.
ROOF RAINWATER HARVESTING:
The learning objective of the course module is to give students an understanding of the types of roofing catchment surfaces and collection containers available.
Practical exercises: 1) Identify different types of roofing and the chemicals they contain. Conduct spreadsheet calculations of catchment for a surface for average annual rainwater. 2) Research the parameters of rainwater harvesting for your jurisdiction and any conditions or restrictions. Calculate the quantity of water your household needs domestically for a year, your roof area, your annual average rainfall, and what water volume your roof surface would have the potential to collect. Answer the questions 1) What amount of precipitation lands on your roof and what volume of storage is needed to collect it? What percentage of the annual rainfall could be captured? What percentage of your household water needs would that meet?
GREYWATER ORIENTATION:
The learning objective of the course module is to provide a definition of greywater, where it comes from, how it can be used or treated, and review greywater guidelines.
Practical exercises: 1) Identify all of the water in your household that becomes greywater, the volume produced, potential uses, and review greywater guideline literature for your jurisdiction. 2) Identify how many fruit trees could be watered annually with the amount of greywater your household produces.
BLACK WATER (SEWAGE) ORIENTATION:
The learning objective of the course module is to provide a definition of black water, where it comes from, how it can be used or treated, reviews sanitation code laws, and identifies exceptions for alternative systems.
Practical exercises: 1) Determine the quantity of black water generated by your household versus the quantity of black water that your community/jurisdiction produces. Identify volume per capita for each. 2) Determine how many fruit trees could be irrigated per year if all of your household’s black water was converted to greywater and fed via subterranean irrigation. 3) Determine the annual weight of food per tree. 4) Research the proprietary black water systems that convert black water to potable. 5) Contact the Department of Public Works or Department of Environmental Health for your jurisdiction and inquire about allowing the use of black water systems on a new facility or at a central jurisdiction plant.
WATER FILTER ORIETATION:
The objective of the course module is to familiarize students with filter systems for potable water, greywater, black water, storm water runoff, runoff from agricultural landscaping, water from vehicle pavement, radiation, toxic watershed chemical spills, and solutions to mitigate these pollutants in the water supply.
Practical exercises: 1) Choose three different filter systems and identify how many gallons per day can be filtered and what proprietary system you would use. Compare these options to a low-tech passive natural building system and the amount of electricity required to run the equipment. 2) Research different filters and determine the costs per year to filter potable water for your household.
MICRO-HYDRO POWER:
The learning objective of the course module is to provide students and understanding of micro-hydro power generator systems.
Practical exercises: 1) Research micro-hydro generators, and using your power bill, calculate how many kilowatt hours per year your household uses. Determine what volume of water stored in cisterns is needed to generate this power and what vertical height difference is needed to produce the generator output. Compare this amount to the velocity of a winter creek in cubic feet per minute. How many hours of creek run is needed to generate your household’s annual power? 2) Research wave power and the equipment needed to meet your household’s yearly power demand.
WATERSHEDS, AQUIFERS, and OVERFLOW SYSTEMS:
The learning objective of the module is an understanding of mapped systems of seasonal versus yearly creeks, streams, and destinations into ponds, lakes, oceans, retention, detention, percolation, and aquifer storage.
Practical exercises: 1) For your local region, use the area of land that your home sits on, your annual average rainfall, and the volume of your cisterns to calculate your watershed. Assuming rainwater catchments are full, calculate the volume, determine what particles are most likely present, and how undesirable contaminants can be pre-filtered out before percolation. 2) Describe what your jurisdiction is presently doing (as a system) to address this situation.
Masters of Blue and Green Architecture, Civilization Infrastructure, and Community Development
Masters of Blue and Green Building, Civilization Infrastructure, and Community Development, is a two year program with 16 courses and thesis. It is the first global formal integrated holistic blue-green building and community development educational training program of its kind.
Global, Sovereign, and USA community leaders will be empowered with knowledge base to perform estimated size calculations of per capita blue-green sustainable civilization infrastructure systems, food production, and buildings, adaptable to different locations, cultures and situations. Taught by: Marilyn Crenshaw, The Green and Blue Architect.
STUDY TOPICS:
Vocabulary and statistics: world water and sanitation, water NGO’s, sustainability, regenerative design, watershed stewardship, LCA embodied carbon footprints, sustainability certification and point systems /accreditation/and labeling.
Water: blue lens of integrated water management of all systems, maximize h2o available, balanced water budgeting, drainage and site stability, watershed stewardship.
Agriculture: Tree Of Life organic veganic fluency, edible landscaping.
Master site planning: site selection, use prioritization for agriculture, utility infrastructure (water, sanitation, renewable power, power storage, transportation, comprehensive green and blue building for privacy vs commons), habitat, orientation, sanctuary and beauty, and relief camp emergency/mid-term/long term settlement.
Green Building: structural systems, passive and smart building hi tech monitoring systems, nontoxic materials.
Overview fluency: a la carte menus applicable to all environments, RandD testing sites, divine geometry and Vastu.
Project finance: phasing, creating a local economy, labor and materials estimating quantities and costs.
Project management: managing engineers and builders, construction camp infrastructure set-up, recycling and waste set-up, permits, stakeholders, operations maintenance manuals, commissioning, local/state/nation/un/trade union laws, trade guilds and professional associations.
On-line Lesson Plans: will build modules of Thesis.
Thesis project : Create location and culture specific program for new agricultural community population of 200 to 20,000, with land use prioritization, identify and quantify per capita eco utility and infrastructure inputs and outputs.
To learn more about Cousen’s School of Holistic Wellness or to request more information about the program please visit: http://www.cousensschoolofholisticwellness.org/programs/blue-green-architecture/