Water Renovation and Reuse

Hong Kong is a coastal city abundant in natural marine resources. Water, had given weight to the city’s economy and had raised many generations. The fishing industry possessed 90% of the city’s population in 1960’s and reached its peak in 1980’s.

However, following the city’s development, the economic center shifted to industry, import & export trading, and then commercial & financial sector. The extended demand on land due to development has resulted in loss of water area and destroy of water ecology. Over the past few decades, almost 7,000 hectares of our waters is lost to reclamation, uncountable amount of marine species have lost their homes, and the fishing & associated industries obscured which the remaining of fishermen dropped to only 0.1% of total population. The water loses its value.

It is one of the examples showing the human society sacrificing water in exchange for more land for the development needs.

In effect, land only takes up 29.2% (510,072,000 sq km) of the Earth’s surface, the remaining 70.8% (361,132,000 sq km) large portion is covered by water, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

In the 29.2% land surface, only 30% of it is categorized as good land that can be farmed, the remaining contains 20% covered by snow land, 20% mountains, 20% dry land, 10% land doesn’t have topsoil.

The development of architecture has always been based on land, roughly saying, more than 99%. Again, the example, Hong Kong, the solution for shortage of land to suit the city’s development goes directly to reclamation. This could be one way of solution.

But is there any better possibilities?

Instead of focusing on the 8.76% (the 30% ‘good land that can be farmed’ from 29.2% land surface) suitable land surface, why don’t we turn our thought to make greater use of water?

Instead of filling up the water to create new land to build, why don’t we build directly on water surface?

As a matter of fact, the ocean contains 99% of the living space on the planet. And, 0.1237% of the water surface is just about to that 8.76% suitable land surface.

It is imaginable that, if we develop 0.1% of the water surface, we are almost duplicating the habitable land, there will no longer be land shortage but creating excessive land; but if we develop the 0.001% of the water surface, integrating with ecology and sustainability concerns, then, some problem of land and environment can be alleviated and solved at the same time.

Floating architecture, may be the pertinent answer. It not only can be the solution to urban dense, but also the solution to climatic change, rise of the sea level, and constantly increasing global population.

Floating architecture can be a combined development forming a floating community, even floating city, serving as an extension of normal society. It could also be some separate floating elements like floating platform, floating house, floating residential complex, floating skyscrapers, floating island, serving more specific functions.

The ideas of floating objects from different scales explore the possibility of making use of water surface through architecture. But, can it be more?

Aside from making use of the mere skin of water surface, the potential of underwater space is also worth noting. The underwater space could be much more than simply filling with soil for supporting the land surface.

Such possibility between water, architecture, ecology and sustainability will be the interest of the thesis project – which is trying to reprofile, revalue and revival of water through architecture.