Commitment 02Read more
Energy Transition and the Circular Economy
Innovative and sustainable solutions for energy and industry in city-port regions
Committing the City Port territory to achieving a low carbon, low resources society, through the transformation of industrial production, and the production and management of carbon-neutral, renewable energies.
How do port authorities create a transborder waterfront while focusing on sustainability?
Numerous cities worldwide have adopted bioclimatic design principles to lower energy consumption and minimise their environmental footprint. This strategy entails re-evaluating building structures and their harmonisation with the local surroundings, taking full advantage of unique regional attributes and opportunities, such as climate, materials, and environmental conditions. Such is the case in Dunkirk, where the Grand Large is a district where architects, guided by the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, created housing steered away from fossil fuels while strengthening community cohesion.
This good practice also includes objective 8.4 (Promoting the architectural and landscape integration of port facilities) of the AIVP’s 2030 Agenda.
The closure of the shipyards in 1988 left a substantial area to the north of Dunkirk's city centre vacant. In a comprehensive urban revitalisation initiative, the Urban Community developed an appealing and relatively dense neighbourhood on this 42-hectare site. The Grand Large project in Dunkirk marks the second phase of the Neptune project launched in 1991, the principal aim of which was to reorient the city back towards the docks. Grand Large concerns a site with a rich port history, home to yards abandoned in the wake of the shipyard crisis in 1987. For the city, which had reached the limits of its expansion, these abandoned shipyards became an opportunity to develop a new sustainable district based on a master plan by Nicolas Michelin, part of the ANMA architectural team.
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