Innovative Sustainable Re-development – Masdar City

This blog article is about Masdar City, a new city project in Abu Dhabi, UAE. The dual core of this project is innovation and sustainability. The goal is to extend the spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation throughout the new city, by growing new neighbourhoods around the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology.

The institute is dedicated to cutting-edge solutions in the fields of sustainability and energy. Economic growth should be encouraged by companies who can partner with the university which accelerates breakthrough of technologies to the market.

The city of Masdar is planned in a way which combines modern technologies with ancient Arabic architectural techniques. The idea was to capture prevailing winds, making the city more comfortable during high summer temperatures. Masdar City also uses clean energy which is generated on site through solar energy. It has one of the largest photovoltaic installations in the region.

The Masdar City Master Plan plays a central role in enabling the city’s success in achieving its sustainability goals. The city is designed to reduce water and energy consumption and it also includes a smart integrated transportation network.

In 2006, company named Masdar was established by The Mubadala Development Company (wholly owned by Abu Dhabi government). The Masdar Institute of Science and Technology was established in 2007, with the on-going support of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The construction of Masdar City started in 2008, aiming to develop the worlds most sustainable eco-city. The city is designed to be a hub for cleantech companies. In September 2010, the first buildings opened, and the Masdar Institute of Science and Technology moved into its campus.

The first phase of the project is expected to be completed during 2015, and final project completion should be between 2020 and 2025. Masdar is guided by The Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030, a programme that drives new sources of income for the emirate and strengthens its knowledge-based economic sectors.

The city itself is located 17km east-south-east from the city of Abu Dhabi, next to the Abu Dhabi International Airport. Besides from others, it will host the headquarters of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

Abu Dhabi is trying to extend its energy leadership from hydrocarbons, and Masdar will play a significant role in this goal. It is using and integrated business model and combining sustainable urban development, investment, R&D and higher education in order to meet the changing needs of the evolving industry.

One of the main missions of Masdar City (and Masdar company which is managing it) is to advance the clean energy in Abu Dhabi and around the world. It is a catalyst for the economic diversification of the emirate.

It was important to detect the influence of the project in all of the four sections, to put emphasis not only on the hard factors, but also on the soft factors of the project, mainly the effect it will have on the community.

In the graphic displayed below, we have mapped the vision of the project, through four main factors that we identified were relevant in all of the projects we analysed.

Most of the financing for this project came through a $15 billion commitment by the Abu Dhabi government. The goal is to get as many investments from independent investors, in order to use less than one-third of the fund that was dedicated to the initiative by the Abu Dhabi government.

Some of the investors so far include Credit Suisse and the Deutsche Bank. Total estimated cost for the project is $22 billion.

In conclusion, Masdar city is the world’s most sustainable eco-neighbourhood, with passive and intelligent building design that reduces energy and water demands. It features the world’s largest cluster of high-performance buildings, and has the design that encourages and promotes zero-carbon public transportation options. It is a mix of educational, retail, recreational, manufacturing housing and office spaces.

At the moment there are several thousand people living and working in Masdar, and it is planned that 40,000 people will live in Masdar City when it is completed. Additional 50,000 people are expected to be commuting to it every day to study and work in Masdar. New apartments, schools, restaurants and businesses keep on being added to Masdar, creating a major modern city.

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Best 16 podcasts from PLANET MONEY over last 2 years

For anyone who knows me, I am an avid podcast listener.  It is something I will promote to literally everyone I know.   The benefits are enormous: Free entertainment Easier than reading Great learning of a variety of topics Exercises … Continue reading →

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The Power HABIT of Successful Consultants

What kind of habits do you have in your life? We have all kinds of habits – some good, some not so good, some may be bad. As a consultant, if you’re focused on growth, if you want to grow your business, to grow your revenues, then you must have one very important habit as […]

The Power HABIT of Successful Consultants is a post from: Consulting Success

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Travel folly: Oh #$^#, this is not my room

Today was a travel day – like most Mondays.  There were two odd things about today. Good  thing: There was no one sitting next to me on the plane today.  I completely spread out, and put my stuff in the seat … Continue reading →

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Attract More Consulting Clients with a Professional Website

Eighty percent of buyers of consulting services and expert services are now going online to search for those experts. That means they’re online right now searching for you. The question is, are you online? Can those buyers find you? Do you have an effective website? Do you have an established online presence and does it […]

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Culture and Heritage–Transmitting Place Identity Through Museums

Much of place identity is communicated through its heritage, of which museums form a significant part. A local or national museum can convey a great deal about a place: about its values, its priorities and how it sees itself, both in an historical and a contemporary sense.

Today’s post is based around a recent interview with French museum-branding expert Corinne Estrada, head of Paris-based agency Agenda. Corinne came to Istanbul to lead the organisation of the Communicating the Museum Conference 2015, which focuses on bringing together museum professionals from around the world to talk about the latest emerging trends and various social influences that affect the situations of various museums and how they interact with and influence the societies in which they are situated.

In our conversation, Corinne reflected on the museum situation in Turkey, noting that there is a distinct ‘gap’ between how the public and private museums present themselves and how they interact with the outside world. She pointed out that the private museums she had worked with in Istanbul had generally been open-minded and had a deep understanding of their assets. On the other hand, government-run museums were more likely to rely on protocol, which gives the feeling of the museum being more ‘staged’. Corinne said: “The private ones were keen to learn and improve, but the public ones stuck more closely to protocol.”

Fortunately, in terms of promoting national identity, the museums of Istanbul are staying close to their Turkish roots. They maintain a distinct sense of national character even in the more experimental, Western-style museums, such as SALT Galata. Corinne said: “The clash of Eastern and Western here [in Istanbul] is very, very rich. It can be seen clearly in the food and the architecture. The museums should focus on this as an asset and take the best of it.”

However, despite the numerous strengths of both Istanbul and wider Turkey in terms of cultural heritage, recent political and social problems have caused a decline in visitors and a rise in perceptions of Turkey as an undesirable place to visit. Corinne told me that some delegates cancelled their conference places because they were afraid to come to Turkey in the current climate. “In the museum business, people are looking negatively on Turkey because of the government. Many are turning to Qatar and UAE instead. But both those countries are very Western. Istanbul on the other hand is all about the Turkish people.”

In terms of using museums as tools in wider place branding efforts, Corinne cited Sydney as a good example of a city that is using its cultural heritage to powerful effect by drawing its museums into an overall branding strategy. “Everyone is involved – it’s a joint exercise,” she said. Philadelphia is another good example of engaging closely with the target audiences, sharing the brand identity with them by encouraging them to produce user-generated content.

Certain cities are defined by their iconic museums, for example Paris, which boasts the world-famous Louvre. Amsterdam and its Rijksmuseum is another, along with Madrid, New York and London. Corinne says that many museums don’t know how to connect with wider audiences, managing only to reach the elites in society.

For example, even when the Louvre holds ‘Public Day’ and opens its doors free of charge, it has trouble attracting people. So the museum has come up with a plan to bring selected exhibits to the Paris suburbs in an attempt to encourage people to become more interested in what the museum has to offer. “A good museum should be sustainable. It shouldn’t rely on public money. For success, it should speak to the emotions as well as to the intellect,” she said.

“Many people feel scared to go to museums because the museums don’t talk to them. They don’t feel they belong to that world. For example, many museum information labels use language that is too high-level for the average person.”

All these issues and more were dissected in detail during the recent ‘Communicating the Museum 2015’ conference in Istanbul. Attendees came from a wide range of backgrounds, including those of design, sociology, and the digital world, along with museum experts from 25 countries. The conference featured a range of digital master classes, brainstorming sessions and focus groups where delegates discussed new ideas to help museums integrate better and give back to their societies. The goal was to figure out ways for museums to make history more relevant in a contemporary context.

Discussion topics included the need to treat museum visitors as citizens instead of consumers, making visitors into brand ambassadors, valuing artists and storytellers, and the importance and necessity of taking risks. Many of these themes feed back into the concepts surrounding effective place branding, and a well-run museum can act as yet another piece in the puzzle that makes up a place identity. Undoubtedly, museums will continue to play a major role in constructing place identity.

This article was originally published on PlacesBrands blog on September 18.

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Consulting tip: don’t read your slides

Last week I was a in a painful 1 hour meeting where the presenter kept reading his slides.  Ouch.  Each page was like a kick to my shins.  Imagine, this is what clients see and feel when you read your … Continue reading →

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