Catch and Store Energy

Definition and orientation

Catch and Store Energy asks designers to identify flows of energy and value—such as sunlight, runoff, fertility, biomass, knowledge or mutual support—and retain part of them in forms that remain useful. Storage is not merely accumulation: location, quality, accessibility, losses, maintenance and eventual release determine whether a store serves the system.

What it guides: the principle helps frame design judgement through questions such as:

• Which useful flows are abundant, seasonal or currently lost?
• What storage form preserves quality and remains maintainable?
• Who gains access, who carries risk, and when should the stored value be released?

Origins, lineage and attribution

This wording belongs to David Holmgren’s twelve-principle formulation. Holmgren published the set in 2002 and describes the principles as memorable thinking tools that open different perspectives into whole-systems design. He also states that methods vary with place and situation and that principles do not substitute for practical experience or technical knowledge.

The Academy’s explanation is an attributed teaching interpretation, not a reproduction of Holmgren’s icon or a claim that Mark originated the principle. Other permaculture lineages may organise similar ideas differently.

Ethical and principle context

Observation identifies the flow; Obtain a Yield tests whether storage supports a real need; Renewable Resources asks whether the source can renew; feedback reveals leakage, depletion or unintended effects. Water budgets and design frameworks add calculation and review, not certainty.

Use Earth Care, People Care and Fair Share to test purpose, consequences and distribution. Apply this principle with at least one counter-question, relevant evidence and a named review point. It should influence judgement without becoming a slogan that certifies a preferred decision.

When and how to use it

1. Name the decision, scale, affected people and living systems.
2. Turn the principle into one or more open questions suited to the context.
3. Add a counter-question that could expose harm, urgency, maintenance or a conflicting principle.
4. Use a relevant framework or tool to gather evidence; do not mistake the method for the answer.
5. Choose a proportionate action and state what remains uncertain.
6. Record what evidence or feedback would trigger review, adaptation or stopping.

Application in Mark’s Diploma and at Vila Pinheiro

Design 05 proposes roof and patio rainwater capture into intermediate bulk containers for irrigation and pond work, reactivation of the existing well as a summer reserve, and swales intended to slow, spread and sink runoff. These are documented proposals. The record does not establish installed capacity, water quality, recharge achieved or later performance, so this page makes no historical result claim.

Evidence boundary: this representative connection was checked in Mark D’Cruz, Design 05: Water Self-sufficiency with Attachments, controlled Diploma PDF, PDF page 20. The master register also records broader use across Designs 1–10; those additional declarations are not converted here into unverified public case claims.

Limits, critiques and common misuse

• Calling any stockpile a store without examining losses, access or useful release.
• Capturing a flow so completely that downstream people or ecosystems are deprived.
• Building storage before quantifying demand, safe overflow and maintenance.
• Reducing energy to electricity while ignoring soil, water, biomass, knowledge and human capacity.

A principle cannot replace consent, law, site-specific evidence, competent technical advice or accountable maintenance. When principles pull in different directions, make the tension visible rather than selecting only the phrase that supports an existing preference.

Where this material comes from

This page follows Principle 2 in David Holmgren’s twelve-principle formulation, published in Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002). Its principal sources are Holmgren’s Essence of Permaculture and the author-led Permaculture Principles publication. Holmgren presents the twelve as connected systems-thinking and design-thinking tools whose expression varies with place and situation. Related phrases and overlapping ideas appear in other permaculture traditions, but this page neither transfers their authorship to Holmgren nor flattens their differences. Mark D’Cruz used and interpreted this principle in his Diploma work; he is not its originator, and the master register records it as LIB-029. The authoritative formulation has been checked against Holmgren’s published explanation. The representative Diploma connection is verified at PDF page 20, with proposed actions and outcomes kept explicitly distinct.

Related entries

• How to Use Principles Without Turning Them into RulesPair the principle with evidence, a counter-question and a review point.
• Comparing Permaculture Principle TraditionsKeep Holmgren’s formulation distinct from other principle traditions.
• Principles, Patterns and Systems ThinkingUse several principles together inside whole-systems judgement.
• David Holmgren: Permaculture PrinciplesFollow the author, publication history and wider body of work.
• Mediterranean Water, Drought and WildfirePlace water storage inside seasonal demand, safety and maintenance.
• Water Budget, Catchment and Runoff CalculationsQuantify supply, demand, storage, losses and safe overflow.
• From Survey to Design at Vila PinheiroSee evidence, constraints and phased choices connected at whole-site scale.