1996 Volume 8 Issue 2 Pages 71-80
A proposal is made to make the ocean surface as the field of human activity in the future.The surface is the only space left on the earth where vast areas as well as air, sunlight and water are easily and freely available. In this proposal, a part of the ocean surface is surrounded by a floating breakwater for forming a man-made bay on the surface. Within the bay, several artificial islands or facilities are designed to float, which include various kin ds of facilities necessary for the purpose of human activities. In the first stage of this proposed project, facilities of the primary industry type are to be built such as grain units, forest units and energy units. For example, the forest unit comprises a pool consisting of a huge rubber boat and stored rainwater, and an artificial ground made by piling up soils on a large-scale rubber mat. The forest unit made of a flexible rubbery sheet is immune to stress concentration. Therefore, the forest unit can be built as a huge construction. Furthermore, it hardly cost to obtain fresh water since rainwater is available. According to our estimation, the unit can be constructed at a cost of 3, 000 to 30, 000 yen/m2. Following the units for the primary industry, units for residence as well as for secondar yand tertiary industries are to be built. Thus, the utilization of the ocean surface would extend the activity field of mankind, and control the degradation of the natural environment.
