Progress
-People have begun to move into the first section of the project to be completed
-City consists of a blend of high-tech deign and ancient construction into ‘an intriguing model for a sustainable community, in a country whose oil money allows it to build almost anything’
-The city will be treated as a kind of continuing experiment, with researchers and engineers regularly analysing its performance, fine-tuning as they go along. No end date given for total completion of the project as the developer says “it will grow at its own pace”
Masdar City
The world’s first zero-carbon, zero-waste car-free city – part of an ambitious plan to develop clean energy technologies. Project is supported by the global conservation charity, WWF.
Project estimated to cost $22billion and projected to take 8 years to build; to be home to 50,000 people and 1,500 businesses.
Abu Dhabi has one of the world’s biggest per capita carbon footprints in 2008.
Masdar City to be mostly powered by solar energy (~90%) with the rest of the energy use supplied by incinerating waste. Resident will move in travel pods running on magnetic tracks. City to make use of traditional Gulf architecture to create low-energy buildings, with natural air conditioning from wind towers
Sceptics fear that Masdar may just be a fig leaf for the oil-rich Gulf emirate – a distraction from the fact that the region otherwise has a heavy carbon footprint
Criticism
-Designs reflect the ‘gated-community’ mentality – the idea of its utopian purity and its isolation from the life of the real cities next door, are grounded in the belief that the only way to create a truly harmonious community, green or otherwise, is to cut off from the world at large.
-Masdar would have only limited relevance to the world most people live in – although the design’s inspired synthesis of ancient and new technologies could have applications elsewhere, it is unimaginable that a city of a few million can be similarly organized with such precision – this fantasy world is only possible as a meticulously planned community, built from the ground up and of modest size.
-What Masdar in effect represents, is the crystallization of the global phenomenon: the growing division of the world into refined, high-end enclaves and vast formless ghettos where issues like sustainability have little immediate relevance – Masdar a self-sufficient society, a playground for tourists and the rich, outside the reach of most of the world’s citizens?
Changes in Plans
-Originally scheduled to be completed by 2015, completion date has been pushed back indefinitely due to the financial crisis which hit the UAE hard.
-No longer planning to achieve zero-carbon emissions but the aim is for low carbon now – original plan recognized as too ambitious or too difficult given the current limitations of renewable energy
-Transport within the city no longer reliant solely on PRTs (autonomous, computer-driven electric car) but electric buses and other mass transit will be included in the mix.
Potential
Designs of buildings and walkways/streets which Masda officials say makes the city feel as much as 70 Fahrenheit cooler than its surroundings – a layout which encourages walking and street life, something rare in Middle Eastern cities like Dubai. This encourages energy conservation – the cooler the city is, the less the need for electricity for air-conditioning
Masdar has enormous value as a living lab for green, potentially far-out ideas that can be underwritten with Abu Dhabi’s oil money
Limitations
-There is a need to changed attitudes and mindsets of actual occupants who are to stay in Masda – most Abu Dhabi citizens are used to keeping their air-conditioning as low as 60F (electricity is also heavily subsidized), whereas in Masda, AC needs to be set closer to 77F to keep within its efficiency targets
-Behavioural regulations and controlled design that keep Masda green might alos limit the free and serendipitous qualities that mark a living city – not to mention discouraging potential residents who might not want to follow such a strict rulebook
-Self-driving electric pods have been done away with altogether, replaced by conventional cars or at best electric ones
-Date for completion has been pushed back to between 2020 and 2025
-Originally touted as a ‘living laboratory” for green technology, now some of its lessons are on how to make do with less