London 2012 Olympic Park designer LDA Design has released their masterplan for Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon including an international watersport and hatchery centre.
Inspired by traditional fishing warehouses and boat houses, the design of the 4000m2 building has been developed by Faulkner Browns as an important component of the lagoon masterplan.
Designed to complement local industry and heritage, the watersport and hatchery centre will provide an ‘outdoors’ focussed centre of excellence for both recreational and competitive sporting facilities alongside sustainably focussed research and development of various marine industries. It will include operational and maintenance facilities, boat storage and wet changing areas, a gateway facility, bio-reactor greenhouse facility and a hatchery.
The dedicated hatchery will house a fully serviced aquaculture system that can support the development and hatchery of oysters and lobsters through an applied seawater circulation system of tanks and hives.
The oyster hatchery spawning process will be enhanced by a glass envelope system to generate greenhouse conditions for optimised algae growth with a bio fence network for algae cultivation. The greenhouse structure is designed to harness solar power, generating clean, low-energy nutrient supply to the adjacent hatchery.
Alex Herbert, Head of Planning for Tidal Lagoon Power said:
“Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon will provide a major water sports facility. The watersport centre will be capable of hosting national and international events and we hope that this will encourage people to participate in sport and make use of the facilities that will be provided. Importantly, we have given particular attention to Paralympic facilities as one of the key attractions of the lagoon is the fully enclosed body of marine water as this enables people of all abilities to train safely.”
“We are also planning a dedicated aquatic research and development hatchery for both native UK oysters and lobsters. We hope that this will become a facility for the sustainable management of native shellfish; promoting advanced knowledge and expertise in mari-culture.”
Alister Kratt of LDA Design said:
“The Western Landfall building will form an important part of the maritime park masterplan including an extensive regional facility for those with disabilities and will enhance this naturally powered zero carbon scheme”.
Mike Hall of Faulkner Brown said “The project is a great opportunity to harness the infrastructure of green energy production for the social benefits of recreational watersports activities”
As the world’s first, man-made, energy-generating lagoon, with 240MW nominal rated capacity averaging 14 hours of generation every day, Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon will provide clean, renewable, reliable and predictable power for over 120,000 homes (enough to power 70% of Swansea Bay’s annual domestic electricity use) for over 120 years. It could be connected to the National Grid by 2018.