The Borborigmynometer // Gwangju Design Biennale

Methane gas is a source of fuel which is currently causing quarter of the world’s global warming. It has been discovered that agriculture contributes to 18% or more of the world’s methane emissions. Microbes in the stomachs of cows, that help the animal break down its food, produce methane that then gets released into the atmosphere through their burps and flatulence. Our research also pointed to the fact that termites also produce methane gas; however their colonies filter the gas before it diffuses into the environment. The Borborigmynometer is a speculative machine that operates by capturing and filtering methane into a termite dome after which it produces food for the cows. We made a small scale version of The Borborigmynometer to illustrate the process. It starts off at the Bovine methane collection dome where the cow’s gaseous eruptions are gathered and goes through four other modules. At the end, food palates are made in the Palletization processor which is fed back to the cow. Our project was exhibited at the Gwangju Design Biennale in 2019 in Gwangju, South Korea.