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Artificial islands

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Mccoy

Geotechnical
Nov 9, 2000
907
This topic was rised in the foundation forum, and it captured my attention.
Strangely, there isn't much that you can find in the web, at least with a reasonably fast search. No specific books as well, as far as I've seen, and a few publications are out of print. Something on Beaufort islands, as BigH says, Renzo Piano's Osaka (or Tokyo? - maybe both) airport, as Jdonville says. Much noise about Dubai's Palms and The world.
Can anyone of you outline the main characteristic of such a project? i.e. :what confinement structures are used, which type of fill, is it feasible to use boulders as a base as in piers. I understand the topic is vast, civil engineering, offshore geotechnical engineering, oceanography, and more. But it's pretty much fascinating.
I'll paste a brief description of Dubai's project, published in the Forbes site:

A Dubai developer is handing out big promises and gold to lure investors and jet-setters to its far-out ventures in the Persian Gulf.
The highlight of the Dubai International Arabian Horse Race at Newbury Race Course in Berkshire, England, earlier this year wasn't Eau Royal's five-length victory. For many it was the two $9,000 gold bricks handed out in a contest created by Nakheel LLC, a sponsor of the event. It was a clever stunt that helped Nakheel attract hundreds of well-heeled attendees to its booth. They queued up for an hour to learn about the developer's 12 over-the-top projects in booming Dubai.

Among them, none is generating more chatter than the World. It's a $4 billion spectacle set to be completed in 2008. The project, a cluster of 300 man-made islands off the United Arab Emirates port, will be arranged as a world map, and the properties will be named for many real places. There are plans for "Ireland," "Thailand" and even "Yemen." Ten islands--average size: 300,000 square feet--have been created. Have a hankering for Utah shrunk to 2.8 acres and moved 7,800 miles? You can get that for $10 million.

Fifteen properties, including "Australia" and "Kuwait," have been sold for a total of $500 million. A large corporate investor is a Kuwaiti investment group called Efad Holding Co. As for private owners, rocker Rod Stewart supposedly shelled out $30 million for "Great Britain." There are whispers that actor Al Pacino snapped up another.


 
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There have been a lot of artificial drilling islands put in the Beaufort Sea (north of Alaska and Yukon Territory) over the years. A few friends from my old days at Golders were working on them for Dome Petroleum back in the late 70s or early 80s. Can do a search for papers by Mike Jeffries who was with Golders, then Dome. I think that there must have been some papers in the annual Canadian Geotechnical Conferences on the subject. Mainly, if my recollection is correct, they are made of gravel - huge islands. I think on my google search, some environmental group was pining about all the gravel used. But, you are right in that not much shows up on searches.
Back in the mid-1970s, Golder was working on vacuum sand islands - huge "rubber" bags filled with sand and then using a vacuum to suck out the air. Made them very very dense. Don't really know what came of it though on a practical sense. I saw some lab work being done on scale models.
 
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