Monday, May 9, 2005

Amphibious Homes According to the third of Elizabeth Kolbert's excellent series of New Yorker articles on climate change, the Dutch are going Waterworld: [A] few years ago one of the Netherlands' largest construction firms, Dura Vermeer, received permission to turn a former R.V. park into a development of "amphibious homes." The first of these were completed last fall, and a few months later I went to see them. The amphibious homes all look alike. They are tall and narrow, with flat sides and curved metal roofs, so that, standing next to one another, they resemble a row of toasters. Each one is moored to a metal pole and sits on a set of hollow concrete pontoons. Assuming that all goes according to plan, when the Meuse floods the homes will bob up and then, when the water recedes, they will gently be deposited back on land. Dura Vermeer is also working to construc bouyant roads and floating greenhouses. ... "There is a flood market emerging," Chris Zevenbergen, Dura Vermeers' environmental director, told me. Half a dozen families were already occupying their amphibious homes when I visited Maasbommel. Anna van der Molen, a nurse and mother of four, gave me a tour of hers. She said that she expected that in the future people all over the world would live in floating houses, since, as she put it, "the water is coming up." As for the people of Tuvalu, whose Pacific island nation is sinking under the waves, it appears the only choice is to build arks. 11:57:05 PM    comment [] Geospatial Intelligence The NGA must have Rummy geeked. To better understand the meaning of the word geospatial, "geo" comes from the Greek word for Earth. "Spatial" refers to place. Therefore, geospatial might be described as the means of finding out what's happening on every place on Earth. 5:32:59 PM    comment []

© Copyright 2005 David V. Johnson. Last update: 6/2/05; 12:36:09 PM. This theme is based on the SoundWaves (blue) Manila theme.