13 November 2002
Two artificial islands, each a square-kilometre in size, could soon be given the go-ahead for construction off Israel’s Mediterranean coast. One would house a new international airport, the other a new city of homes and businesses.
Even at an estimated cost of $1 billion each, the islands could be a cost-effective solution to the high demand for living and office space around Tel Aviv, say the islands’ backers. But local environmentalists are unimpressed.
“The islands will serve as a barrier to the natural northwards flow of sand,” says Philip Warburg, executive director of the Israel Union for Environmental Defense. “This will in turn severely erode beaches and possibly cliffs for miles north of the island.”
Each island could block the movement of between 50,000 and 200,000 cubic metres of sand every year. However, Yoram Zimmels, professor of civil engineering at the Technion, the university where the artificial islands were first conceived, says the annual costs of shifting sand around an island would be well under $1 million. “All cities require maintenance – this isn’t a real problem,” he told New Scientist.
A string of artificial islands off the Mediterranean coast was first suggested by a team at Technion seven years ago. The engineers were inspired by Japan’s success at building artificial islands, Zimmels says. The design involves depositing rock boulders and sand within retaining walls, a construction process that could take five to 10 years.
“Everybody wants to live near the shoreline. We thought it would be an important future solution to prime land problems,” Zimmels says.
After years of consultations and international reviews of the plans, the Israeli government has announced that a panel chaired by the director-general of National Infrastructure Ministry will present their final recommendations on the two-island proposal in three months’ time.
The islands would be teardrop-shaped, situated about one kilometre offshore and linked to the mainland by bridges. “Even one kilometre away, they would affect the flow of sand on the bottom of the sea – but this will be much less than if the islands were closer,” says Zimmels.
But according to Israeli financial newspaper Globes, the business sector is sceptical about the islands. Senior industrialists have doubted the ability of the banks and other institutions to finance the project.
“The cost is phenomenally high,” Warburg agrees. “And any housing construction on an artificial island would have to be very dense to justify the mammoth capital and maintenance costs.
“If one were to apply similar standards of urban density on land in Tel Aviv, there are abundant locations where one could accommodate the same number of residences and the same need for commercial space at a lower cost and much lower environmental impact.”
Zimmels believes the islands could make financial sense. But he is concerned that Technion experts could be excluded from final construction plans, at a possible cost to the environment.
“It is very important that we should be involved in advising about what to do,” he says. “We are impartial. But the people who want to build them will of course have economic interests.”