Is this your Future?

While in London i went to the Science Museum to have a peek at -among other things- Is this your Future?, three scenarios elaborated by Onkar Singh, Anthony Dunne and Fiona Raby for the new Energy Gallery .

They consist of a collection of hypothetical products and photographs by Jason Evans exploring the ethical, cultural and social impact of different energy futures.

The first scenario imagine that local communities are producing their own energy. Would churches, school or families develop their own brands and compete on the market? Would family members wear a special uniform to advertise their brand?

For years, in rural China, human poo was used to fertilise paddy fields. Even today, poo is sometimes left by dinner guests as a "gift" for the host to return the nutrients from the meal to the soil. Inspired by this, the second scenario ask whether social behaviour and etiquette would change in a world where the main resource was human sewage.

The designers imagined a day in the life of little Lucy Jones. At her friend's house, she would collect her poo in a gift bag and give it to her friend's mum as a thank-you-present, so she can use it as an energy source. Lucy would bring with her a compartmentalised lunch box at school to bring her poo from school and use it to make heating or electricity at home.

The last scenario is for products fuelled by blood, and is inspired by the gastrobot that derives all its energy requirements from the digestion of meat. The Jones family would use blood as an energy supply and to make it less scary the blood would be put into nicely-shaped pouches.

Inside the radio, bacteria living in a microbial fuel cell would convert nutrients from blood into electricity. Children would feed an animal into their television.
The questions raised by the scenario are: would animals be exploited in a new and horrible way? Where would the meat and blood come from? Special energy butchers and pet shops?

ICON magazine has an interview of Raby and Dunne.