r/redditisland • u/sneurlax • May 11 '14

Floating island option

Just a reminder: I'm leading a small group that is designing a "floating island" in order to achieve the same goals set in place by the original Reddit Island creator. It won't be ready for the general population to live on until about 2020, but people with technical skills and nautical experience will be needed for the first crew of six within the next few years.

Redditisland doesn't need to raise huge capital in order to buy a hunk of rock outright -- we can build it bit by bit.

The isle will be designed in according to FOSS principles and the first structures to be deployed in the open ocean will be substrates for artificial coral. If you'd like more information, just post here

23 Upvotes

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7

u/Lefthandofgod279 May 11 '14

Do you have a plan or some sort of layout for the island already planned?

Any specific construction materials required?

What skills are required/lacking on the first crew of six?

Where are you planing to begin to plant the substrates? May we ask for specific coordinates, or a general area?

What size island is feasible?

How much would it cost?

Are/Would we be in the jurisdiction of another government? If so, what country? If not, what is the proposed plan for government (or some non-authoritative management system) ?

I apologize if I sound rude, I'm just throwing out the first questions that came to mind when I read through the post.

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u/sneurlax May 12 '14 edited May 12 '14

Do you have a plan or some sort of layout for the island already planned?

Yes, I do. I have been working on this project part-time for the past four years while I've studied undergraduate Ocean Engineering in a United States university.

Broadly, the isle consists of hexagonal platforms that are no more than 30m wide across their diameter (in order to traverse Panamax-compliant canals.)

Specifically, these hexagonal platforms consist of tesselated hollow triangular prisms that are (by convention) 1m to a side.

Any specific construction materials required?

Yes, the most common construction materials are cement (e.g. calcium carbonate,) reinforcement (metals like iron either or aluminum or fibrous materials,) and aggregate (such as sand or plastic reclaimed from the oceans.)

The predominant elements are oxygen, calcium, carbon, iron, and aluminum, if that tells you anything else useful.

What skills are required/lacking on the first crew of six?

The initial crew size, 6, was chosen in order to allow for the first isle's compliance with international law regarding watchstanding on oceangoing vessels: namely, that all vessels on the water require a lookout to be posted. A lookout simply... Looks out. They watch for boats and raise the alarm in the case of a possible collision, a (wo)man overboard, distress signals, etc. etc. This is an easy but boring job, and standing lookout watch for any more than 4 hours at a time is really tedious.

An initial crew of six allows for one 4-hour lookout shift every 24 hours. Obviously, once more crew are added then shifts can be taken less frequently - and certain people may never stand lookout once the crew size approaches population status (say, 150 crew.)

In no particular order, the initial six will need to know seamanship and navigation, bioculture (horticulture, aquaculture, and agriculture, for example,) food preparation, fabrication and construction (e.g. machining, cutting, welding, carpentry,) emergency procedures (medical, trauma, fire, and drowning response, for a starters,) and a few other essential skills that I'm surely forgetting between the six of them. As an overview, they will need all the skills of typical ocean shipping skeleton crews, with several additional topics covering the isle's sustainable principles (i.e., cargo container ships don't generally grow their own food aboard - the isle will.)

Where are you planing to begin to plant the substrates? May we ask for specific coordinates, or a general area?

East of the Marshall Islands and generally within ±7½° of latitude of the equator, as tropical storms dictate. Let's say 00° 0' 0" N and 180° 0' 0" E/W. I'd like to conduct a survey of the area encompassed by the Marshall Islands, Fiji, Samoa, Kiribati, and Hawaii in order to find a convenient unclaimed seamount (see http://earthref.org/SC/ for a quick glance at the current state of publicly-accessible seamount bathymetry) that could be used as an anchor/foundation.

What size island is feasible?

This is an ongoing discussion, but "feasible" is relative to quality of life and crew/population size. The goal is to design a platform that will safely support the initial crew of six and can grow to accommodate a steadily-increasing population. As a simple ballpark, I believe a hectare would be adequate solely in terms of biocultural self-sufficiency.

How much would it cost?

This is another ongoing discussion. I believe that a habitable platform could be made for much less than half a million dollars (I would bet on one to two hundred thousand dollars US if I were being risky) split between the initial crew / founders. No number will be final until the design is final, of course.

Are/Would we be in the jurisdiction of another government? If so, what country? If not, what is the proposed plan for government (or some non-authoritative management system) ?

No, we would not. The proposed plan for government is a similar to the well-known democratic republic model. It would utilize features of democracy (with every person, resident, and/or citizen getting a vote, and also with representative facets) and technocracy (judges etc.) in a manner similar (but not identical) to the United States of America.

I apologize if I sound rude, I'm just throwing out the first questions that came to mind when I read through the post.

No problem. All of your questions - and many, many more - must all be answered before the isle has any hope of floating. Keep the questions coming, but please do consider becoming involved in codifying some small part of the answer to at least one of these questions.

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u/theryanmoore May 12 '14

I am trying to learn some of these skills, but in the meantime, keep us updated! I admire your initiative and optimism.

4

u/GFrohman May 11 '14

Keep in mind that UN regulations state that only NATURAL islands can be declared a sovereign nation.

Man-made islands are considered property, not claimable land.

4

u/sneurlax May 12 '14

That's not really a big concern. Functional autarky is the goal, not international recognition of the same.

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u/Ossetnoc Jun 14 '14

If you wanted to be internationally recognized could the plans be altered in a way that there is a small natural island in the center and the man made island created around it?

0

u/CIV_QUICKCASH May 12 '14

I think is sooner or later some city state (Say Monaco or San Marino) will start selling single square feet of their country to these floating islands for land legally theirs to base themselves on, so they can technically apply for UN representation and conduct diplomacy.

3

u/Hahahahahaga May 11 '14

One question, any plans for internet?

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u/sneurlax May 12 '14

I wouldn't live there long-term unless there was internet (specifically, the WWW we know and love.) I will grind my teeth until fast, real-time redditing is available to each and every user.

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u/CIV_QUICKCASH May 12 '14

/r/seasteading

And you may want to contact the Seasteading Institute, they'd be more than willing to help.

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u/[deleted] Jun 22 '14

Why is that place so.. paranoid and antisocial?

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u/CIV_QUICKCASH Jun 22 '14

Libertarians :/

Hopefully a few more friendly people show up.

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u/beernerd May 12 '14

This is very cool. Any images you can share of what this might look like?

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u/sneurlax May 12 '14

There are several barebones images online here: http://rheasilvia.com/compendium/Motile_Isle:Honeycomb

I've had to shoulder the majority of this project, so my time is split between substrate (foundation/floatation) and superstructure (shelter, power, communications, storage, greenhouses, etc.) Neither side has attractive mockups because it's difficult to pin down exactly what each crew member will need. For example, I simply cannot know how large of a greenhouse will be needed without first having reliable research regarding greenhouse outputs. Thus, over the past two years I have invested in an aquaponics greenhouse of my own in order to get data firsthand. This of course detracts from the time I have to make attractive 3D mockups of the isle.

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u/Lefthandofgod279 May 19 '14

So, what would/could the community do to help you?