It is also known as the name of lilypad (the
highly ribbed leaf of Victoria water lilies). Ecopolis means small city and this concept has come for climate
change refugees. As we know global
sea levels predicted to rise significantly over the next century due to climate
change, a lot of people living in low lying areas are expected to be displaced
from their homes. Vincent Callebaut is a Belgian ecological architect propose this concept. It is completely self-sufficient floating city that would accommodate up to 50,000 people.
Design concept
It is designed as a double skin of the floating “ecopolis” it means it will be made up of two part one part is below the water and the other one is above the water surface. the lower portion which is immersed in the water located on the center which will be worked as an artificial lagoon.
The upper portion will be constructed on three
marinas and three mountains as you can see the picture.
the whole structure will be constructed of polyester fibers which are covered by a layer of
titanium dioxide (TiO2), which would react with ultraviolet rays and absorb
atmospheric pollution via a photocatalytic effect in the same way as
the air-purifying concrete. TiO2 has low
toxicity, less resistance, and less corrosion and has semiconductor
properties.
Amenities
It is an amphibious city without any roads and cars and
the whole city is covered by plants housed in a suspended garden. A lilypad
will float around the world as an independent and fully self-sustainable home.
It has a lagoon at its center for soft water collection and purification of
rainwater and this artificial lagoon is also entirely immersed, thus ballasting
the city. It enables to live in the heart of the subaquatic depths. The multifunctional programming is based on
three marinas and three mountains dedicated respectively to work, shops, and
entertainment. The whole set is covered by a stratum of planted housing in
suspended gardens and crossed by a network of streets and alleyways with an
organic outline.
Energy
By only using renewable energies, this design has
zero carbon emission
and it produces more
energy than it consumes.
Energy sources could include:
- Biomass
- Osmotic power
- Phytopurification
- Solar thermal
- Solar photovoltaic
- Tidal power
- Wind energy
Challenges
Entirely auto-sufficient, Lilypad takes up the four main
challenges launched by the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development) in March 2008 – climate, biodiversity, water, and health. It
reached a positive energy balance with zero carbon emission by the
integration of all the renewable energies (solar, thermal and photovoltaic
energies, wind energy, hydraulic, tidal power station, osmotic energies, phytopurification, biomass) producing
thus more energy than it consumes! A true biotope entirely recyclable, this
floating Ecopolis tends towards positive eco-accountancy in oceanic ecosystems
by producing and softening itself oxygen and electricity, by recycling the CO2and
waste, by purifying and softening biologically used water and by integrating
ecological niches, aquaculture fields and biotic corridors on and under its
body to meet its own food needs. This means that it will be eco-friendly and
will run on renewable energy. It will only float and move about with the
currents and movement of the seas themselves. Neither the cost of the building
the city nor the cost of living there has been revealed.
To reply to the mutation of the migratory flows coming
from hydroclimatic factors. The Lilypad
joins on the mode of anticipation particular to Jules Verne’s literature, the alternative possibility of a multicultural floating Ecopolis whose metabolism
would be in perfect symbiosis with the cycles of nature. It will be one of the
major challenges of the 21st Century to create an international convention
inventing new means to accommodate environmental migrants by recognizing their
rights and obligations. Political and social challenges apart urban sustainable
development must, more than ever, enter in resonance with human sustainable
development
.
Why is it important?
The international scientific scene assets that a
temperature elevation of 1°C will lead to water rising of 1 meter.
If the first meter is not very funny with more than 50
million of people affected in the developing countries, the situation is worse
with the second one. Countries like Vietnam, Egypt, Bangladesh, Guyana or
Bahamas will see their most inhabited places swamped at each flood and their
most fertile fields devastated by the invasion of salt water damaging the local
ecosystems. New York, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hô
Chi Minh City, Shanghai, Miami, Lagos, Abidjan, Djakarta, Alexandria… not less
than 250 million of climatic refugees and 9% of the GDP threatened if we do not
build protections related to such a threat. It is the demonstration inflicted
to reluctant spirits by a climatological study of the OECD (Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development) and that challenges the imagination of
eco-conception
.
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