Sea’s water desalinization plant in Almeria

Details_

• CLIENT: Programa A.G.U.A – AcuaMed
• PROJECT: Riccardo Crespi Architetto (AdHocMsl)
  
• AREA: 120.000sqm
• BUDGET: 200.000.000€
• PHASES: Preliminary and final design, tender drawings | Site supervision | Completed

Project description_

Within the program A.G.U.A. the Zapatero government,  we were commissioned  to design and be responsible for  architectural and landscaping integration of complex for the desalination of seawater. Client’s request was to convert the project to install a “transparent” system of information and communication of the industrial transformation process, since it was at that time very disputed and subject of many complaints from the population because it was wrongly considered to be reasonable of the increased pollution of the city.

It was not only to “open the doors to the people” – which is actually something impossible since this type of system has a strictly restricted access – but also to create a path, totally independent and without interfering with daily activities, that it would freely used by anyone. The request was to have a new building that would representative of the new approach of the company becoming a new space for the citizenship.

As a Concept  we get inspiration from the foam, not only for his own relationship with the foam sea, however mostly because we were interested in its cellular structure as continuous aggregate of cells, connected spaces, fragile and constantly changing.

The foam concept led us to imagine a path similar to a wire grid structure “stretched” over the various buildings and warehouses that, thanks to its alternation of full and empty spaces, allowed to be viable and penetrated by the visitors and at the same time it could be the protagonist of the  different phases and components of the industrial process.A real “Water Route” where visitors could follow the path of water from sea water to drinking water, verifying personally the different stages of the process.

In this way the visitor has the chance to be directly in  contact with the industrial process that becomes the main actor of that amazing and exciting experience .Facilities as cafe’, restaurant, conference room , exhibition center, and small shop are displaced in the beginning of the exhibition path.

Building’s roof is architecturally treated to be an artificial landscape. A place to be, and to stay as it would a public artificial garden, with children’s playground, a kiosk and fountains with water coming from the plant itself.

Unfortunately, due to the change of government, to the budget’s reductions  and its related  slowdown in the process, our design has undergone numerous and substantial changes in its final form.

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