58 - BIOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATION Fraunhofer magazine 1.19 Lessons from the rain forest Population growth, dwindling resources, a lack of sustainabil- ity – to get a handle on problems like these, the human race could do worse than turn to nature and its ecosystems. Take the tropical rain forest, for example... Text: Janine van Ackeren There’s a rustling and a scurrying deep in the undergrowth of the shady forest floor. High above, monkeys swing through the treetops, while dazzling tropical birds hover beneath the leafy canopy. The air is alive with the hum of buzzing insects. Here in the rain forest, different species cohabit more closely than in almost any other habitat. And they do so without destroying their living environment. “That’s because there’s a closed-loop economy with an almost optimal utilization of resources – any nutrients released are promptly reused,” explains Prof. Christoph Schäfers, acting director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Molecular Biology and Applied Ecology IME. “There’s been a sustained habitat here for a long time, and resources are stable. The various species have been able to adapt, specialize and then occupy highly diverse ecological niches. This has led to the establishment of a so-called climax community or ecosystem.” For this to happen, it requires a smart system that generates value by capitaliz- ing on diversity in an environment in which all the available niches are occupied. From climax ecosystem to climax economy That’s all well and good – but what does it have to do with the problems facing the human race? “Quite a lot,” says Schäfers. In many ways, nature can serve as a role model or source of ideas. And it can do so not merely in terms of suggesting concrete technologies, but also by helping us to answer the question of how we can ensure that limited resources remain available for coming generations – the question, in other words, of how we can sustainably manage our habitat here on Earth. transport. For a long time, people looked upon the car as a universal solution. With the threat of vehicle bans, however, people are starting to rethink their transport choices. What is urgently required is a change in mindset. “If we continue to focus on growth and try to squeeze out every last drop, we are going to destabilize the planet,” says Schäfers. “Resources flow into the industrialized countries, yet all the population growth is taking place in the developing and emerging nations. What are now described as migration flows are in fact a mere trickle, compared to what is going to happen long term if we don’t do some rethinking. At that point, the idea of a climax ecosystem will become meaningless, because there will no longer be any stability. Our goal must therefore be to optimize recycling and interconnectedness. By analogy with a climax ecosystem, we could describe this as a climax economy.” No blanket solution What this might look like in concrete terms is best illustrated by examples from areas such as transport. In our cities, transport infrastructure is hard pressed to cope with the growing volume of traffic. In particular, there is often the problem of the last mile: passengers can get close to their destination using public transport, but not all the way. The result is they take the car. “Following the model of a climax ecosystem, this is exactly where smaller players can make a valuable contribution to solving this problem,” says Dr. Florian Herrmann, division director at the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO. “By using digital platforms to provide a suitable transport solution – for example, electric scooters as part of a smart sharing concept – they can occupy a niche that has hitherto been neglected.” When it comes to a climax ecosystem, the key word is diversity. “There is no one blanket solution to be applied to all of the problems,” Schäfers explains. “Instead, we need a whole range of approaches, just like in the rain forest.” And this is exactly what we see in the area of ARENA2036, a research program involving Fraunhofer IAO, is showing how cooperation between startups and other companies can be encouraged and strengthened. In effect, it has created an open ecosystem in which various industrial companies, startups and research organizations can work together. Energy: smart grids for efficient energy supply In the field of energy, too, Schäfers is convinced that diversity is the way forward: “Building larger and larger centralized power-generation facilities is an idea that belongs to the last century. And wind energy can’t provide the sole solution. Instead, what we really need is an interconnected system that enables us to balance power generation and power con- sumption.” Herrmann agrees. To this end, his colleagues are currently working on micro smart grids. These grids link different components of the energy infrastructure, such as buffer batter- ies, photovoltaic systems and hydrogen storage solutions, so that the energy required to supply a small local area – e.g., a housing development – can be generated, stored, utilized or released in the most efficient way. Agriculture: robotics enables small-scale farming Drive through the countryside, and it’s plain to see: fields are getting larger, monocultures are on the rise and diversity is disappearing. “This is clearly the wrong path to take,” says Schäfers. “We’re way past the stage where we can maximize yields in this way.” The aim, he says, should be to move in the opposite direction and diversify production. Until recently, small-scale farming wasn’t an option. It was simply too time-consuming and costly. Sooner or later, however, robotics should make this kind of agricultural diversification profitable.