Dissertation 2019

Amphibious
Cities
Bamboo Architecture in Water

Devansh Khare 4A
 -Abstract-
Rapid urbanisation and the progressive nature of development has resulted in a decrease in
the availability of land for space and human growth. In coastal areas land reclamation is
practiced to enhance this resource which results in the disruption of natural sea bed lying
below it and modification to the coastal environment. Floating structures can provide a
solution to this problem while exploiting the green surface and leaving the suburban green
intact. These floating cities can be constructed of lightweight materials such as bamboo,
 -List of Contents-

Introduction
 Aim
 Objectives
 Scope
 Limitations
 Methodology

Chapter One: Urbanisation in Coastal Cities

 Origin of coastal settlements
 Current scenario of urbanisation in coastal cities
 The effects of land reclamation in coastal areas due to rapid urbanisation
 How do current practices affect carbon footprint and the environment?
 What can be done to cater to the current issues of rapid urbanisation and the lack of
land in coastal settlements?
 Are current housing methods sustainable for the ever-increasing demands set by rapid
urbanisation?

Chapter Two: Timber- The truly sustainable construction material

 The history of timber as a construction material [Studies on Traditional Japanese
wooden architecture and joineries]
 Sustainable qualities of timber
 Sustainable Forestry
 Types of timber
 Structural analysis of timber
 Cross Laminated Timber: The New Steel
 Bamboo as a construction material
 Various structural shapes of bamboo
 Methods of working on bamboo
 Preservation of bamboo
 Applications of bamboo for various kind of structures

Chapter Three: Offshore Structures

 Design of Offshore Structures
  Types of Offshore Structures
 Mobile and fixed drilling platforms
 Tension- Leg Platform (Tethered Buoyant Structures)
 Effect of sea waves and seismic forces on offshore structures

Chapter Four: History of Water and Timber

 Study of the first wooden structures on water; boats and ships
 Study of the adversities wood faces as a material in water
 The effect of water on the mechanical behaviour of wood
 Effects of humidity on shear behaviour of bamboo

Chapter Five: Sustainable Floating Cities

 Studies on currently available floating housing typologies and various structures
 Correlation of wooden boats and ships to bamboo structures
 Study on the construction technology of a floating system
 The role of timber in the creation of true sustainable group housing systems
 Application of Modular technology with respect to timber
 Can the structure survive a minimum of thirty years?
 Research on the feasibility and strength of the structure through Parametric tools such
as the ‘Karamba’ plugin of Grasshopper to test it in a simulated environment through
the application of seismic forces.

Conclusion
Bibliography
 -Introduction-

Major metropolitan cities are becoming the central urban hub all around the world. This is
because people from smaller nearby towns are migrating towards these hubs in search of job
opportunities and education, thus creating a wave of rapid urbanisation which the cities are
failing to cater to. In such cases landlocked cities like Delhi still have the opportunity to
unfurl radially and merge with the towns nearby, but the problem arises when coastal cities
like Mumbai has to face the same problem. Due to a lack of land to begin with, these cities
have no option but to reclaim land from the adjacent sea which disturbs the sea bed and
results in a decrease in the quality of water. Another issue with rapid urbanisation and current
housing trends is the ever-increasing overall carbon footprint. In light of the above issues, this
study aims at two aspects; usage of a sustainable material such as timber and catering to the
need of rapid urbanisation in case of coastal settlements, thus resulting in the hypothesis of a
floating city using truly renewable materials such as bamboo.
Aim: This study aims at developing a floating group housing project via a truly sustainable
material such as bamboo to overcome the problems faced by rapid urbanisation and rising sea
levels in coastal cities.

Objectives:
 To investigate the current trends in urbanisation around coastal areas
 To study timber, specifically bamboo, as a construction material through an
understanding of its composition, cell structure, sustainable properties and most
importantly its reaction towards water
 To investigate the basic fundamentals of a floating system
 To develop a floating house typology by taking into consideration its endurance to
lateral current effect, floating stability and foundation system

Scope: The scope of the study is to study the currently available floating structures and
apply the same in devising a method to construct a sustainable floating housing community
offshore land, thus catering to the problems faced by coastal cities due to rapid urbanisation.

Limitations:
 The study will majorly focus on the technology behind floating structural systems and
the application of the same. The study does not include the detailed analysis of the
structural system itself.

Methodology
The Research has been based on both primary and secondary methods of research to help
define the context of the study, and the study provides adequate and enough examples and
data, the leftover data has been a part of the research. This research presents case examples,
books and research papers which defines the process of construction of housing communities
floating on water on several cases and in all over the world. Primary case study will also
include computer simulations of the structure on various parametric software to test the
structural integrity and various other factors. The studies have been summed up into a
literature review considering case examples and referencing.
 -Literature Review-

The loss of habitat linked with land reclamation is becoming vividly apparent as coastal cities
continue to expand. The study ‘The effects of urbanisation on coastal habitats and the
potential for ecological engineering: A Singapore case study ’enumerates additional
coastal alterations during the subsequent two decades, analyses the potential impact of future
development plans, and synthesises the mitigation options available. Assessments of
topographical maps between 1993 and 2011 disclose a deterioration in total cover of
intertidal coral reef flats (from 17.0 km2 to 9.5 km2) and sand/mudflats (from 8.0 km2 to 5.0
km2), principally due to extensive land reclamation. On the other hand, mangrove forests
have improved (from 4.8 km2 to 6.4 km2) due to restoration efforts and greater supervisory
protection. However, 15 and 50-year projections based on Singapore's 2008 Master Plan and
2011 Concept Plan show that all habitats are projected to shrink even more as new
reclamations are finished. Such fall may be countered, at least in part, if ecological
engineering is used to help preserve biodiversity. The problems exemplified by Singapore,
and the potential future solutions discussed in this paper, provide guidance for urban marine
conservation in coastal cities that are experiencing rapid urbanisation and land use change.
A major chunk of energy used in the production of mainstream construction materials is a
fossil fuel derivative, and embodied energy is an important factor in determining a material’s
impact on the overall carbon cycle. As timber and other products derived from forests are
majorly constituted of atmospheric carbon, they have a very different impact on the carbon
cycle when compared to other materials as discussed in the study ‘Timber as a sustainable
building material’. The study further elaborates this point; the primary mechanism of
photosynthesis consists of two segments; any plant having chlorophyll releasing oxygen into
the atmosphere and simultaneously absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. This
process is called carbon sequestration. To produce one kilogram of wood a tree absorbs 1.47
kilograms of carbon dioxide and releases 1.07 kilograms of oxygen to the atmosphere,
subsequently acting as a carbon sink in the process. The ability of a tree to act as a carbon
sink deteriorates with increasing age as growth gradually slows and organic matter starts to
decay, releasing the stored carbon dioxide back to the atmosphere. This therefore implies that
plantations or regrowth forests have a higher capability to sequester carbon from the
atmosphere as compared to mature forests, as they are maintained in a perpetual state of net
growth due to repeated harvesting. This process is called sustainable forestation. Thus, the
timber in buildings and other wooden products sequester carbon from the atmosphere for as
long as the building stands and way longer if the timber is not burned. The embodied energy
of a material measures the total amount of energy consumed in the process of transforming
raw materials into ready to use construction materials. It is expressed in gigajoules per tonne
or megajoules per tonne. The embodied energy that the materials of a building consumes
plays a significant role in the total life cycle energy consumption of the building. Embodied
energy includes: the energy required to obtain raw materials, process them and then produce
building material, the energy used in transporting the material at all stages and the energy
used in construction via using that material.
In the study ‘Non-linear dynamics of offshore structures under sea wave and earthquake
forces’ the dynamic response to offshore structures in random seas to inputs of earthquake
ground motion is presented. Focus is kept on the calculation of nonlinear hydrodynamic
damping effects due to sea waves for the earthquake response. The study concludes that
hydrodynamic damping forces are higher in random seas than in still water and sea waves
mostly reduce the seismic response of offshore structures. Several studies on the first passage
probabilities of response indicate that small sea waves enhance the reliability of offshore
structures against seismic forces.
In the study ‘Effects of Humidity on Shear Behaviour of Bamboo’ it is said that bamboo is
a naturally occurring biological composite, however its microstructure and hence its
properties are very complex compared to the manmade composites. Due to optimization, it
can be assumed that the variation in properties along the thickness of the culm be a smooth
transition for better bonding strength between layers and to prevent non uniformity in stress
concentration. As a consequence, biological structures are complicated and functionally
graded. Hence, a realistic model that can capture the mechanical performance of bamboo is
valuable in future design of robust multifunctional composites. This paper presents the results
of experimental and numerical studies on the torsional (shear) properties of bamboo. The
hierarchical and multi-scale structure of bamboo and the distribution of micro-scale fibres are
revealed via laser scanning and atomic force microscopy. This information was incorporated
into a finite element model to analyse the mechanical behaviour of bamboo under torsion and
to estimate the shear modulus of bamboo along the fibres. Moreover, the effects of humidity
and therefore water content on the mechanical properties of bamboo were evaluated by
performing torsion tests on samples maintained in environments with different humidity.
Increasing the humidity does not cause a drop in the shear modulus, however, a jump in the
shear modulus did occur at around 60% humidity. Results of this study indicate that the
highest strength values in samples occurred in environments with humidity levels between
60% and 80% and undergo a significant drop after that. In higher humidity, the samples
behave more ductile.
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Kagoshima University, Japan
Schkweitzer, R. (2004) Traditional Japanese Wood Construction, Internales Holzbau.
Tanabashi, R. (1960) Earthquake Resistance of Traditional Japanese Wooden Structures,
Bulletins - Disaster Prevention Research Institute, Kyoto University (1960), 40: 1-15
Ambica, A. (2015) Floating Architecture: A Design for Hydrophilic Floating House for
Fluctuating Water Level Indian Journal of Science and Technology, Department of Civil
Engineering, Bharat University, Chennai
http://www.koruarchitects.co.uk/choose-sustainable-timber/
https://skyrisecities.com/news/2016/12/floating-city-wave-future
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=vetYAeh9MUI&list=PLlk2evJtSQ7kU7aavrnkLEa6qTyuHUygh&index=2&t=0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=XSuZ6ukuz5s&list=PLlk2evJtSQ7kU7aavrnkLEa6qTyuHUygh&index=
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/240310662_Numerical_simulation_of_Kadomtsev-
Petviashvili-Benjamin-_Bona-Mahony_equations_using_finite_difference_method