Speculative Design: Harnessing Human Bioenergy

It started as a joke — a wearable that runs on flatulence — and turned into a seven-part thought experiment about the human body as a power source. What begins with a “fart reactor” ends somewhere serious: the mechanics of capturing bodily energy, the taboos and social norms in the way, the other outputs (sweat, motion, heat) already being harvested in labs, and the ethics of who owns the data your body makes. Speculative design doesn’t predict the future; it builds an absurd object so the ordinary one sneaking up behind it becomes visible. Read it in order, or jump in anywhere.

1. Start hereMar 2025

   Fart Reactor

   A Glimpse into Tomorrow Picture this : You step into a softly lit coffee shop. It looks like any modern café: sleek tables, a warm wood interior, and people quietly immersed in ...

2. Part 1Mar 2025

   From Taboo to Technology: Why Farts Might Be Worth Harnessing

   Farting is often the punchline of a joke — an embarrassing, smelly fact of life that many prefer to ignore. Yet as odd as it sounds, these taboo gas emissions contain valuable e...

3. Part 2Apr 2025

   Inside the Fart Reactor: A Look at the Hypothetical Mechanics

   Welcome to the second article in our series on speculative bioenergy design. In our previous piece, we explored the taboos surrounding flatulence and why turning it into an ener...

4. Part 3May 2025

   Breaking the Silence: Social and Cultural Impacts of Body-Powered Devices

   In the first two articles, we explored why someone might harness flatulence for energy and how a hypothetical device could convert gas into usable electricity. But technology do...

5. Part 4Jun 2025

   Beyond Farts: Other Human-Based Bioenergy Innovations

   So far in our speculative bioenergy series, we’ve explored the provocative idea of turning flatulence into energy. Yet, human-generated bioenergy doesn’t end there. Innovative r...

6. Part 5Dec 2025

   Design Challenges: Comfort, efficiency, and privacy concerns

   Harnessing human-powered energy sounds exciting — until you have to wear the hardware all day. Whether we are talking about a sweat-fuelled patch, a body-heat generator, or our ...

7. Part 6Sep 2026

   Ethics and Ownership: Who Owns the Data Your Body Makes?

   When the body becomes a power source, the energy is a rounding error and the data is the asset. On who owns what your body produces — and who really benefits.

8. Part 7Sep 2026

   Speculative Futures: Where Human-Powered Tech Could Lead Us Next

   The finale of the speculative bioenergy series: three futures for human-powered technology — hopeful, grim, and boring-but-likely — and what the whole strange arc was really about.