Environmental Challenge Organisation's ECO-House

Update 231108 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 02:09:00 +0000

A new day. New boxes. New volunteers. And a shining sun.
A perfect planting day. Here we go :

Some of the new unprepared boxes.

Zhikai (Deputy Chief Planting Officer) supervises:

Here are our helpful volunteers of the day!

And a group pic at the end of the day jus before it started to rain heavily:

Update 221108 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 23:32:00 +0000

The monkeys are everywhere....

Update 191108 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 10:06:00 +0000

We realized that it is not enough to just plant 6 plants per row because some plants will be always washed away due to the heavy rain the last few days!!

This is what happens to the plants after a couple of days using the old method:

new method:

Hopefully this time enough plants will survive and sustain.

Update 161108 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 01:01:00 +0000

While most of the plants are doing quite well some just don't want to grow....
Heavy rain and extreme heat don't support the planting either.

We are looking forward for the next voluntary planting session this coming Sunday!
Hopefully the sun will come out again.

Here are some pics of the plants which are refusing to grow...

Where have all the plants go???

Update 041008 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 07:39:00 +0000

With the help of more volunteers we were able to finish all of the prepared boxes.
30 more boxes to go next week....

We were even able to experience an interesting observation.....

Update 240908 Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 03:44:00 +0000

The first setback we had to experience after the heavy rain on Wednesday. With devastating results.... :(
We had to replant quite some boxes and started to dig in the plants more firmly.

Update 220908: Green Roof Planting

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:45:00 +0000

Weekend planting went great. It was interesting. We had a couple of volunteers helping out. And learned couple of pointers of planting.

Meanwhile, here are some pictures of some hands on.

And of course, video on HOW they are doing it was also taken. So if you are in for a short peak...here it is:

ABOVE: A quick view on how the planting of individual seedlings look like

ABOVE: Volunteers planting...competition!

And of course some learning pointers for the net batch of volunteers as well:
1. Please wear long sleeves and pants!
2. If not, do bring insect repellent!
3. Bring a towel because you WILL pespire...ALOT!

Update 180908: Planting Green Roofs

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 02:12:00 +0000

The planting went somewhat well. We are working on well with couple of people each time.

We have the place roughly setup.

Also, we have the soil mix ready in the boxes to be planted with the little "shrubs" which will eventually go onto the roof of the house.

And we also have our experience that planting the roof in the evening is not good. The location for our planting doe not have night lightings.

We now still constantly need people to help plant the roof! We need YOUR help.

Here is the updated schedule:
20th Sept 2008 (2pm - 6pm)
21st Sept 2008 (2pm - 6pm)
22nd - 26th Sept (2pm - 6pm)
27th & 28th Sept (2pm - 6pm)
2nd & 3rd Oct (2pm - 6pm)
4th & 5th Oct (2pm - 6pm)
6th - 10th Oct (2pm - 6pm)
11th & 12th Oct (2pm - 6pm)
18th & 19th Oct (2pm - 6pm)

Things to do:
1. Pruning of existing plants to use it as the new plants for our soil mix (we need to have this in order to plant. Take it like it is the seedlings for the new plants)
2. Planting in the soil mix boxes

For week days:
We will focus more on the 1st thing to do.
For week ends:
You will do both (if we have enough people)

Bear in mind that we need to do 1 then 2.

We will be meeting at:
Bus stop infront of The Salvation Army Family Thrift Stores (Looks like a Giant Ship)
Upper Bukit Timah Road (Map as per below)

Please meet at the stated time frame and drop Wilson A call at 91474541 should you get lost.

UPDATE 140908: VOLUNTEERS NEEDED FOR GREEN ROOFS!

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 03:41:00 +0000

Dear All,

Thank you for your kind interest in assisting the planting of the green roof on your valuable weekends (and hopefully weekdays).

The first session went great!

Here is the schedule for the week:
16th Sept 2008 (7pm - 10pm)
18th Sept 2008 (7pm - 10pm)
20th Sept 2008 (2pm - 6pm)
21st Sept 2008 (2pm - 6pm)

We will be meeting at:
Bus stop infront of The Salvation Army Family Thrift Stores (Looks like a Giant Ship)
Upper Bukit Timah Road

When reached, please do drop Wilson a call at 91474541. Or please sms in advance to inform him you are coming.

The place is about 10mins walk from the bus stop up and please do wear casual attire.

Please feel free to drop Wilson a call again for further clarifications.

p.s: Please text Wilson at 91474541 once you got this email. We do not have all your mobile phone. Sorry about it.

With Warm Regards,
New Mole.
(On behalf of Wilson)

------------------
Footnotes:

Updated Dates to plant Green Roof are at:
22nd - 26th Sept (7pm - 10pm)
27th & 28th Sept (2pm - 6pm)
2nd & 3rd Oct (7pm - 10pm)
4th & 5th Oct (2pm - 6pm)
6th - 10th Oct (7pm - 10pm)
11th & 12th Oct (2pm - 6pm)
18th & 19th Oct (2pm - 6pm)

Email akim.enomoto@eco-singapore.org to register. Or drop an sms to Wilson at 91474541

A day as Mumbai Rubbish picker

noreply@blogger.com (Phoney Bustard) — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 13:43:00 +0000

Very happy to see that we have collected a lot of materials over the past 2 days @ Defu Lane & Tay Paper Recycling Plant. At the recycling plant, there were trucks offloading cardboard & bulldozers shoving the pile of cardboard to a conveyor belt. Then among all the ruckus were 2 rubbish pickers - Ariff & myself, looking like 2 rubbish pickers from Mumbai. Ha ha. Good fun!

Anyway, back to the materials. Thanks to Peiting & Sharleen, we got 8 tyres & some thin pieces of wood. Then, today, Ariff & I got cardboard (abt 50cm high pile), 11paper core (various sizes), 11 tins (big hole: good for use as pigeon hole). See attached image. Also, there is a spoilt wooden chair, some styrofoam & fabric.

The stuff is all (except for fabric) at Mun Yee's wonderful place.

Also, there is a pile of unwanted chairs & tables at a nearby bar. Can take if we really want them.

Next sat, construction starts!

Recycled Living Space: Full steam ahead!

noreply@blogger.com (Phoney Bustard) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 09:11:00 +0000

For those who not aware, Recycled Living Space is the part of EcOasis that showcases how "old/ used/ waste" materials can actually be turned into functional & FUNKY furniture & accessories!

Our team consisting of Peiting, Hanisah, Didier, Mun Yee, Jie Wei, Sharleen and myself have been coming up with lots of interesting ideas for this space. For myself, I've always been in the engineering & sciences field, so its certainly enlightening when those in the team who are more design oriented share some of the things that can be done with old junk. However, even the volunteers who are not in the design field impress me with their creative ideas!

Currently we plan to have a dining table made from leftover wood & tires. We have various designs for chairs which would involve using cardboard, tin cans etc. We will be getting materials from various sources such as recycling companies & factories.

If you have lots of old stuff to throw away, or are interested to share your ideas, pls contact me at yihan666@gmail.com

Thanks!
- Yi Han

Coming Soon @ Science Centre

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 09:39:00 +0000

Catch this banner being put up at the ECO House building site.

Proudly done by our volunteer designer, Hong Kiat.

EcOasis!!! Lets GO!! This weekend!

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 17:25:00 +0000

Hey guys!

Wonderful to have met up and see such enthusiam for the project. I believe I have a great bunch of pple to make this EcOasis a success!

We are starting on the Green Roof and carrying on with our RWHS (Rainwater Harvesting System) this weekend!

Would like to invite you to the sessions below. Pls revert your interest to me asap (1 or/and 2) as i need to gauge if we are having too many hands for these sessions.

First come first serve!! =)

1. Stud Plants Preparation

Date: 01 Mar 08 (this Sat)

Time: 9.30am - 12.30pm

Venue: 100 Dairy Farm Rd.

Brief: Our Landscape Architect will be getting the friendly garden aunty to teach us the transplanting, propogation techniques, etc. Singing to the greens will come in later sessions.

2. RWHS + Greywater Trial Systems

Date: 02 Mar 08 (this Sun)

Time: 10am onwards

Venue: 100 Dairy Farm Rd.

Brief: We're carrying on with the testing of rainwater harvesting & greywater system. Our lead water-men will go thru the basic ideas with new volunteers and start to get the hands dirty!

Thanks! Hope to hear from you soon!!

Feel Free to sms me @ 98236252 for any queries.

Ah Yao~

First Round of Rainwater Harvesting System (RWHS) Experiment

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 14:05:00 +0000

And now we get our hands dirty!

Last week we did some shopping, now we took couple of those GIANT dispenser bottles for some experimentation.

In deep thoughts of how it should connect together.

Well...eventually the joints and fixtures weren't enough so we went out to get more.

Yeah! More shopping! :P

And finally, we produced the FIRST RWHS Prototype of EcOasis! :

Hm....not too shabby. :)

Well...at least we got the prototype up and running. We will leave it over the next few weeks to see how the trial works out. And we'll improve on it further when we come back.

Looking for some internal components

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 15:37:00 +0000

It was a day of "Shopping" for the internal components of the ECO House.

We started at about 1pm, the team went down to Geylang to the various hardware shops there to buy the required components after recommended by Uncle Kiong.

Yes...the above picture is none other than Ah YaO~ . The one who manages volunteers who wants to get their hands dirty on the internal component of the ECO House.

Here is LJ posing at the site that Jia jia, our main volunteer Architect, has offered to use to build our prototype. The Green Roof and walls will be done here as well. ;)

And so we transport the stuffs we bought there.

Around evening, we turned to IKEA to do some shopping. To get some materials.

Before that, we had ourselves a meal first. And the picture above, you will see the SUMPTUOUS FOOD from IKEA! Bon Apetite!

Then we "shopped" around.

Picture below: Checking out a sink. Ah..inlet and outlet. How can we pipe in the rain water source and where does the grey water goes.

As we went around, we were pretty excited and wished our kitchen could be like IKEA's. Or we can do something like that.

And then suddenly...EUREKA!

LOOK! We realized that the various display sets in the IKEA Show room matches out allocated dimension of the "kitchen". We were thought for awhile and it triggered us to perhaps approach IKEA to get a set for our kitchen.

We liked this kitchen set! Well...and many others!!!!

Afterall, IKEA is a green brand and has a culture of not wasting materials.

This particular display caught our attention. :)

And now...we were looking around at some other furnitures (below picture) such as having a living room with materials made from reused materials.

But yeah...we were only dreaming. We don't have space for that. The rest of the house is intended to be used for conducting training and really used reused or recycled material to decorate it. It will be a creative area.

Now, the next thing we need to do is to find a chance to meet up IKEA and propose the idea to them and hopefully they will support our ECO House.

*Fingers Crossed*

Looking for Volunteers: EcOasis - Getting your hands dirty

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 00:08:00 +0000

EcOasis

Finally, the dream becomes reality.

On 16 Jan 08, Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Minister for Finance & Minister for Education, planted the seeds for EcOasis at the Singapore Science Centre. Together with our generous sponsors, the team saw the beginning of EcOasis.

This project was conceived in 2006 as a tangible showcase for environmental technologies. Located in the Eco Garden of the Singapore Science Centre, the EcOasis will be useful as an educational platform for casual visitors or teachers bringing their students for field trips.

In addition, the EcOasis will also be part of ECO Singapore's Enrich! Programme on environmental sustainability. This program aims to instill the fundamentals of sustainable living and motivate the participants to start taking actions in their daily lifestyle

We Want YOU!

From now till the completion of EcOasis in April 08, we need 10-15 volunteers to help with the trials and construction of the various systems within the EcOasis. Key Systems include:

Rainwater-Harvesting
Green roofs & walls
Bio-diesel
Grey-water recycling
Recyclable Living Space

Volunteers will need to commit about 2-4 hours per week for these two months. No prior knowledge is required but passion for the cause is highly recommended!

To volunteer, pls email volunteer@eco-singapore.org or sms YaO @ 94233204.

PS: Please help forward this to as many people you think might be interested as possible.

ECO Singapore Speech (With ENRICH! Video Clip)

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 00:43:00 +0000

Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam
Sponsors
Friends

I would first like to thank the Minister for taking time off his normally hectic schedule, now his doubly hectic schedule, to be with us this afternoon for the groundbreaking ceremony of the EcOasis.

The EcOasis a good example of what can be achieved in a partnership between government, non-governmental organisations and the private sector united in a common purpose.

To this end, I would like to thank the Singapore Science Centre for their support in providing the site for this unique and meaningful project.

I would also like to thank all our sponsors for all their support and encouragement.

This project was conceived in 2006 as a tangible showcase for environmental technologies. Located in the Eco Garden, the EcOasis will be useful as an educational platform for casual visitors and teachers bringing their students to the SSC for field trips.

In addition to its use as an ad hoc educational platform for casual visitors, the EcOasis will also be part of ECO Singapore’s Enrich! Environmental Foundation Programme, which will be launched next month. This half to one-day customised programme, intended for students from Primary Five to Secondary Four, will highlight fundamental issues on sustainable living. Comprising six modules, it will complement and reinforce what students are already learning in school subjects like geography, science and social studies, while weaving these subjects together within an environmental context.

I would now like to share with you a short video clip on what an Enrich! Programme offers to students.

(Video of Enrich! Programme being screened as below)

I am delighted to announce that ECO Singapore will offer this programme to schools without charge in 2008.

Thank you very much.

ECO House: EcOasis Ground Breaking Ceremony

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 13:03:00 +0000

Today is the day!

Here are some picture shots of the event.

Above: Completed ECO House Model

Below: Technologies that can be found in the ECO House:

Turn Out for the Ground Breaking Ceremony:

Speeches:

Explaining the ground breaking procedures and its meaning:

GOH and Sponsors doing their part to plant the "Stud" plants that will eventually be on the Green Roof:

Mitsubishi Explaining about their PV Cells:

BCA Explaining the concept and reason for green buildings:

Sharing more about the Green Roof and how it works also as a rain water harvesting system:

Guests being explained by the volunteers on the expected ECO House and its components:

Well done team!

Debrief at the end of the day.

One day BEFORE the Ground Breaking Ceremony

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 15:55:00 +0000

The tension starts to build up. We are working hard on a couple of things for the ground breaking:

1. Final Stages of the model for display on the ECO House.

We were still running to buy some last minute materials for the ECO House on some touch up part. Both Joelle, Jiajia and myself did this until about 11.40pm at night. Way past Joelle's bedtime. By the time we were done, she was really whacked.

NB: Well, we WERE watching Heroes Season 1 while we were doing the model. :)

2. Checklist on all possible guests that will be down.
Have invited friends and partners whom we are in touch with. Who have been supportive of ECO Singapore's activities and has keen interest in what we do. Thou this was a humble event, they were very forth coming and supportive about what we do. A total of 35 Guests were confirm. This list does not include staff from the Science Centre and our volunteers from both ECO Singapore end as well as Tanglin Secondary School.

3. Certificate of appreciation to all sponsors.
The frame for the certificates finally arrived at the Brash Basah Complex Porpular bookshop! We went to collect it. But when we reached, it was closed! We had to buy the next day.

4. Editing of the video footage that was done on Friday to be shown during the launch.
Here is the first cut which we had to work on:

Total of 4mins 15 seconds. It would be too long and it is. Ryal went down to Christine's place to help do the edit. We have to reduce to at least HALF of it.

5. Confirmation if there is any press at all to cover this event.
This is a mile stone event for us. And as much as possible, we hope to be able to get some coverage about the project. Thou there is no physical structure, we really look forward to have media coverage to share more about this project and hopefully this will help us raise mroe awareness about our humble project and find more sponsors for this initiative.

A Facebook note...

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 22:29:00 +0000

Title:

ECO House: EcOasis Ground Breaking Ceremony

Dear All,

We are proud to share that tomorrow afternoon at 3pm, at the Singapore Science Centre ECO Garden, we will have the ground breaking event for the ECO House: EcOasis.

This humble project has been brewing for a long time between volunteer young architects, engineers, marketeers and various individual from different walks of life. It has came a long way and finally, we are going to see it take shape starting tomorrow.

The event will be graced by Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam, Minister for Finance and Minister for Education.

This project is a milestone for us, ECO Singapore as a whole which YOU are part of, because the ground breaking marks the beginning of this unique project bringing together various partners from the public and private sectors.

Last but not least, the essence of its becoming are the relentless efforts by the youth.

For those who are interested to learn about the progress of it, please feel free to visit it at:
http://www.eco-singapore.org/ecohouse/index.html

We hope the story of ECO House: EcOasis will inspire more of you to realize that dreams can come true if you stick to it and believe in it, and along the way be willing to learn and adapt to changes.

Alot of challenging situation and decisions were made, but it was all worth it.

VOLUNTEERING OPPORTUNITY:
Starting tomorrow, we will be going forward to BUILD the ECO House. We will need all the manpower we can get to help out and the commitment level will start somewhere end Feb till end Apr where the ECO House is targeted to be completed. and YOU can play a big part.

- Hands On volunteers
To help in the MAKING of the ECO House. For those who want to ge your hands dirtied and also improve on the ECO House internal components.

- Volunteer ECO Trainers
You will be trained to bring children through the ECO House and the ENRICH! Program that will be held at the Singapore Science Centre ECO Garden.

Interested? Email to volunteer@eco-singapore.org

Warm Regards,
Wil

Two days BEFORE Ground Breaking Ceremony

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 17:11:00 +0000

Two days before the Ground Breaking and we have a whole list of things that still needs to get done. Visiting Mr Richard Tan from Enviro Space on the ground breaking ceremony planting for the GOH and sponsors.

Upon reaching down to discuss about it, realized that there was a need for help on the plants. Mr Tan needed help to prepare it.

Mr Tan brought me around to see the green roofs and walls he has designed. Also, he also showed the green roof cross section.

Here is a short clip:

Model Making for Ground Breaking

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:17:00 +0000

Jia jia and Joelle are rushing over the weekend to build up a model of the ECO House at Joelle's place for the ground breaking ceremony.

Above: Joelle cutting the part of the roof structure.

Above: Jia Jia making the Green Walls of the ECO House.

Above: Both Jia jia and Joelle concentrating hard on the model to make sure it looks good.

Above: Short Video on the new ECO House model for the ground breaking ceremony.

As time approaches to THE ground breaking ceremony, we are getting all excited. This has indeed been a very long journey for us to make it this far.

Next thing to get prepared if the ground breaking METHOD. To allow our GOH and sponsors to do something symbolic and meaningful for the initiation of this project.

Floor Space Marking

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 18:55:00 +0000

Today marks a very significant day of our ECO House building. At least to me.

The contractors are down at the site today to do some testing if there are any cables below the site that we will be doing the piling for the building of our structure.

And also, the contractor also marked out the floor space of the ECO House. The exact location. As we watch the contractor slowly placing the pegs onto the floor, a sense of satisfaction was felt down the spine. We have finally made it this far. The gush of excitement and immerse satisfaction went to my head. We are seeing the fruits of our labour coming into shape. Our perseverance made it through, we are on our way to build the first ever youth led ECO House in Singapore.

Going on CNBC

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 10:24:00 +0000

We are in the final works of the ECO House. We just got an email mentioning that we would be featuring the ECO House and the efforts done on it on CNBC. This is part of a documentary that Mitsubishi is in.

This is a good coverage for us as we manage now to get a good form of publicity and recognition from the public to know the education efforts and strong partnership between Mitsubishi Electric Asia Pte Ltd, Building and Construction Authority (BCA) and ECO Singapore.

Truly a good 3P (People, Public Private) partnership.

Updates on the Egineering Calculations

noreply@blogger.com (Wilson Ang a.k.a ShamU) — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 06:16:00 +0000

Time is running out....

We are doing our best to race the clock to firm up everything as much as we can to be submitted to the Building and Construction Authority (BCA).

We had a quick meeting with the YOUNG Engineers at ARUP Facade Engineering to work out all the necessary details.

Here is a video clip of the discussion.

And one more:

Things are going well. With the support from all the relevant agencies, we are good to go.