Photos © Nigel Young / Foster + Partners
Foster + Partners'
ambitious plan to create “the world’s first carbon neutral zero-waste city” is slowly becoming a reality of epic proportions. The prototypical sustainable city,
Masdar, is currently under construction twenty miles outside of Abu Dhabi. When finished, the city will be powered entirely by
renewable energy, making it one of the world’s most sustainable urban developments. This past week, residents started moving into the new 3 ½ acre area surrounding
Masdar Institute, the city’s very own sustainability-driven research center, which is devoted to the development of alternative energy.
Inspired by the architecture and planning of traditional Arab cities, Foster + Partners seamlessly combined ancient building techniques with modern technological advancements. Meshing these two distinct forms of design, they created a city in which tradition is as important as modernization.
Rising from the archetypical desert landscape are two opposing styles of buildings. Laboratories are housed in modern concrete structures covered in a strong translucent plastic called ethylene-tetrafluoroethylene topped with photovolactic panels. On the other hand, residential buildings are clad in an undulating terra-cotta-like latticework based on traditional Arabic mashrabiya screens that mimic an architectural vocabulary indigenous to the area.
[...] Foster + Partners officially inaugurated the solar-powered Masdar Institute, the first phase of their ambitious carbon-neutral Masdar City. The net energy-positive institute [...]