sunflowers

Thought behind the thought: 

Nature has its own operating system. Some unknown programmer has developed it millions of years ago and everything manages to fall in with the master plan without fail. Driving down to the rural outskirts of Pune we came across one such happy, bubbly Sunflower field. How orderly were the flowers? Each soaking its own share of the sun. Not greedy, not lazy not one of them was complacent. All of them moved in tandem in the set path as if the drill had been taught to them ages back. The Sun was the master and not one flower dared to look away. Nature amazes us, inspires us and most definite teaches us. Are we really as observant as we should be?

About the Art: 

Biomimicry is an approach to innovation and design that seeks sustainable solutions to human challenges and problems by emulating nature's patterns and strategies that are time tested. Biomimicry uses either the form or the function of a natural object or both and studies its workings. Based upon which, a solution can be found for bettering human existence in a sustainable way. Sunflowers - An Electric Garden in Mueller Village, Austin Texas, contains fifteen flower-shaped photovoltaic solar panels that are modelled on the form and workings of the Sunflowers.

According to the designers, public art team Harries/Heder, the solar SunFlowers were meant to celebrate the message of ecological stewardship championed by the developers and the city of Austin. These panels collect the sun's energy during the day to power the installation's complex series of blue LED lights which are lit up at night. Not only does it make the Mueller Village energy efficient it actually has been returning electricity to the city's power grid since monitoring began.

The landmarks website allows one to monitor the energy collection in real time. This is a public art installation and visitors can follow the cobalt blue trail on the property very easily as they stand out in the surrounding landscape. These industrial flowers are supposed to represent the devotion of Texas City to energy conservation. So far the flowers have managed to produce 300,000 kilowatt hours of energy and the numbers are growing. This is worth 451024 miles of carbon emission from an average American car.

Credits:

http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mueller-sunflowers

http://inhabitat.com/austin-texas-gets-an-electric-sunflower-garden/sunflowers4/

https://roadtrippers.com/us/austin-tx/attractions/mueller-sunflower

http://the-grackle.blogspot.in/2010/05/public-spaces-solar-sunflowers.html