Adaptive Ecologies

A Visionary Urban Layer for Post-Carbon Cities

Abstract

The built environment lies at the center of two converging environmental crises: escalating carbon emissions from the construction industry and the chronic mismanagement of agricultural waste. According to the United Nations Environment Programme (2022), the building and construction sector accounts for approximately 39% of global energy-related carbon dioxide CO₂ emissions, largely due to energy use in operations and the production of high-emission materials like concrete and steel. Simultaneously, the Food and Agriculture Organization (2021) estimates that more than 4 billion tons of agricultural waste are generated annually, much of which is burned in open fields, emitting black carbon and exacerbating both global warming and public health risks.

In response to these intersecting issues, this paper proposes a visionary urban layer—a modular, adaptive, and ecologically responsive stratum that overlays the existing urban fabric. Drawing from speculative and conceptual precedents such as Constant Nieuwenhuys’s New Babylon (Wigley, 1998) and Neil Spiller’s Visionary Architecture (Spiller, 2006), this layer functions as both a spatial framework and a systemic intervention. Grounded in Donella Meadows’s theory of systemic leverage (1999) and inspired by Winy Maas’s The Sponge manifesto (2021), it incorporates mycelium-based biomaterials, closed-loop pyrolysis systems, and architectural strategies for carbon capture and waste transformation.

The study contrasts a prototype of this urban layer, based on an evolved Earthship typology, with conventional construction methods in terms of carbon footprint, material flows, and ecological integration. It argues that visionary architecture, once dismissed as utopian, must now be engaged as a practical tool for ecological resilience and material circularity.