God made the earth, the saying goes, and the Dutch made the Netherlands. But they didn’t just stop there. The wonders of Dutch Engineering Far beyond the levees, or dikes, are flood protections in vast areas of the country that have been reclaimed from the sea and are below sea level.
In fact, one of those wonders is an office that doesn’t have to worry about sea-level rise at all — an ultra-climatic one. An obvious danger in the world – because it is designed to float on water.
Floating office
Made from recycled materials and wood that can be reused, Floating Office Rotterdam (FOR) is a carbon neutral three-story building that uses various sustainable design principles. It sits on the Nieuwe Maas River and is designed to float if the water level rises due to climate change. FOR uses solar panels to generate its own energy and water from the Rijnhaven harbor for internal cooling. It appropriately houses the headquarters of the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA), which works on climate change solutions.
When they came up with the idea of a climate-friendly floating office, the makers must have thought of leaving nothing to chance. But that’s exactly the kind of holistic climate thinking Holland likes to practice. It would not be wrong to say that some people are eating it and living. Because the ‘Green Village’ on the campus of the Delft University of Technology (TU) in Delft is a ‘Living Lab’ for sustainability where people can live while testing innovations from a sustainable building. and renovation of future energy systems and climate-friendly cities.
If there is room for environmental science, the Netherlands has also created a ‘Room for the River’. It is a project that seeks to convert agricultural areas into floodplains to enhance water management and, in the process, reduce flood risk by giving rivers more room to flood.
The future is ready.
Thinking outside the box can’t be a bad bet to come up with ideas for sustainable living. It’s even better if the box itself is designed to be future-proof. This is what the future residents of Lancsmere came down to do. They came up with a master plan and every other detail for their unique neighborhood in the town of Klemberg, which incorporates the principles of eco-towns and includes reusable materials and urban eco-farms. Residents themselves maintain a neighborhood park equipped with an integrated water concept that includes retention ponds, halophyte filters, and WADIs (water drainage infiltrations).
Built on former farmland around a protected drinking water extraction area, Lanxmeer provides facilities for recreation, water extraction, and food production while exhibiting sustainable urban planning.
The Dutch believe that their lessons learned from climate adaptation can be helpful if shared widely, especially for a country like India, which faces its share of environmental threats. “Leading organizations from both countries are exchanging ideas and best practices on water management, climate adaptation, and sustainability,” said Dutch Embassy officials in India. He said that such collaborations show how Dutch innovations can contribute to India’s and the world’s long-term resilience to climate change.
The author was in The Hague at the invitation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands.