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Limeburners Point boat harbour takes out major environmental award
Friday, 11 June 2010
11:45 AM
Media Releases
The City of Greater Geelong’s Environment and Natural Resources Unit has taken out a major State environmental award for the Sustainable Design Boat Ramp Facility at Limeburners Point.
As part of the 2010 Victorian Coastal Awards for Excellence, the Limeburners Point project took out the award for the Coastal Building and Design category.
Council’s portfolio holder for Environment, Cr John Doull, said the Limeburners Point boat harbour had high levels of use and visitation for recreation and water-related activities.
“It is located in a largely modified urban coastal setting, just one kilometre from Waterfront Geelong,” he said.
Cr Doull said that among the notable features of the new facility’s design was a 3kW vertical wind axis generator – one of the first of its kind installed in Australia.
“The energy generated by the turbine supplies the necessary electric power for the energy requirements of the new facility, with any excess being fed back into the national electricity grid,” Cr Doull said.
“Vertical axis wind turbines have the advantage of being able to produce energy in a wide range of wind conditions, and are silent when in use.”
Cr Doull said lighting at the new Limeburners Point facility had been upgraded to the latest technology for energy-efficient lamps.
“Other features of the facility include an on-site sewage treatment system for the public toilets, as well as the liquid waste from the fish cleaning facility.”
“The system then pumps the treated waste water up to the nearby Geelong Botanic Gardens, where it is used to irrigate a revegetation site,” Cr Doull said.
“With regard to the boat harbour itself, the innovative ‘island’ design creates safe boating conditions during difficult wind conditions, by the use of very large geotextile fabric containers.
“This technology creates minimal wave reflection due to the absorption qualities of the geotextile fabric.”
“A further benefit is the minimisation of any disturbance to the coastal processes.”
Cr Doull said even the car park design contributed to the environmental friendliness of the new facility.
“The car park has been designed with a bioretention drainage system that captures hydrocarbons and sediments that run off the asphalt, filtering them through the root systems of the nearby indigenous plants and a sand trench, before discharging them into the bay,” he said.
“Landscaping has also been a major consideration in the design of the facility, with more than 15-thousand indigenous grasses, groundcovers and shrubs having been planted already,” Cr Doull said.
He said a further 7,500 indigenous plants would be put in before the end of the year.
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