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VICTORIAN DESALINATION PROJECT

WONTHAGGI
VIC AUS

Client:THIESS DEGRÉMONT JOINT VENTURE

The $3.5 billion Victorian Desalination Project is one of the biggest infrastructure projects in Victoria’s history.

The desalination plant will be the largest in Australia. It will supply up to 150 billion litres of water a year, independent of rainfall, to Melbourne, Geelong and regional towns in South Gippsland and Western Port.

We undertook an analysis of the different ways that we could approach the central design problem of integrating large built infrastructure into the coastal environment of the process plant. We identified three broad approaches; an expressed object in the landscape, objects as part of the landscape and hybrid solutions.

These approaches were illustrated in a very conceptual way. We discussed the potential for the history of land art to help us with the design process. We reviewed international and Australian examples of how large infrastructure had been placed in a landscape context, and analysed these examples for positive and cautionary lessons.

We proposed a set of design principles, to guide our decision making including
a seamless integration with the ecology of the site where all elements are inseparable. Thr project is a positive transformation of the local landscape form, a new landscape of sustainability through creation of a place with community value and sense of pride. Furthermore, the project had to have best value for money for the State, whilst being beautiful, efficient, innovative and a pragmatic design solution.

ARM concentrated on a hybrid solution as the most likely conceptual direction. This quite evidently placed a high degree of emphasis on the integration of landscape and architecture, which is an exact fit with the Request For Proposal requirement. From this integrated approach we generated the concept we call the Green Line as the major integrative gesture. The Green Line has its origins in several sources; the history of land art, the idea of the large figure in the landscape, the history of Aquarius and the contemporary concerns of sustainability.

The project is a joint venture by ARM and peckvonhartel. The concept design team included AAE Architects of France, Aspect Landscape Architects and peckvonhartel.