How about we create an independant ocean community?

When thinking about survival strategies and true freedom then it seems to me the ocean holds massive potential, after watching the recent zeitgeist film i thought about why something can't be done today, obviously anything on that scale won't work in the current world system but whats stopping people getting a boat and the materials needed to setup an independent ocean community based on such ideas?

It doesn't need to be expensive and can actually be done rather cheaply with enough people working together for a common goal, lots of materials can be recycled and used, like plastic bottles to create islands, energy from waves, wind and solar, clean drinking water evaporated from the ocean thanks to the sun, hydroponic food, low power devices (led lights, laptops, wifi for communication) etc.

We just need to use whats available to us, there's plenty of useful information out there and i think it would be an incredibly fun and interesting project, we just need to work on a plan, even if its simply hypothetical for now i think it could make for a really interesting thread.




If we pick a nice sunny location with good weather, perhaps close to a tiny uninhabited island, we will have the start of something great, i imagine eventually it getting big enough we could setup a circle of homemade wave energy generating tubes, this would turn the center area calm so floating islands won't have much trouble staying in place, with enough freely available plastic bottles we could create enough land to do whatever we want, best of all we can move where ever we want, enjoying the sun and sea and visiting new places, it would make for a pretty sweet lifestyle!

reply to post by just theory


I think something like that would actually be a really cool place to live. The biggest issues I can think of would be transportation to and from the city unless you keep it relatively close to shore. Sea planes could be one solution, but if the city floats out into the middle of the Pacific even that could be difficult.

Another thing I just thought of is the possibility of some kind of underwater city, like a massive submarine that sits just below the surface. I think you'd be more safe from natural events like storms and it would be much harder to spot from the air. It would probably be more expensive to create and maintain, but I bet there's an eccentric billionaire somewhere that would be interested

Ya know... The Rastafari movement or Rasta brotherhood, believes that is what's going to happen.
someone is going to build this magnificent floating city to be a utopia for the Rasta's...

Personally I find it a tad worrisome as when you ask where??? they elude to it being out in the Bermuda triangle????

reply to post by warbird03


I think anything is possible when people work together for a common goal, there's so many ways this could be done and ways it could advance, it would need to start simple and as things progress and come together we could have a floating paradise, a simple life yet with the comforts we are all used to.

Small groups of people from all around the world could work on their islands and when they're self sufficient they can tow them out to the larger community location where bigger and better things will be worked on.

At first I was skeptical but actually pretty cool. The biggest forseable problem I could see is the doing it in the US im afraid they would say you are polluting the environment unless you keep all you poop and pee on the island thats why they outlawed a lot of house boats unless they were connected to a dock pumpout system im sure there are other legal issues like in most states it is illegal take sand from a beach. Just one more way gor the gove to screw open minded free thinkers but still nice post lets try it.

reply to post by just theory


I think the biggest challenge that an ocean community like this would have, is obtaining enough potable water for the settlement. You could import the water, but that would be expensive. The settlement would be spending all of its cash to get it. You could also buy those machines that pull moisture out of the air, but I don't think those are industrial enough yet to sustain larger populations.

If you were talking 20 people, importing it with the rest of your supplies wouldn't be too bad. Though if you're getting into the 100's, that would pretty difficult.

The other main problem that I think would go hand in hand with the water problem would be cash. So great, you have a large community of people in the ocean, now what? Sure, you could plan the community to be self-sustaining, maybe even set up some sort of rotating crop setup so that you could grow your own food, but again, you will need to import a lot of water as well as other supplies. Where are you going to get your money from?

Unless your eccentric billionaire angel investor was always funding you or all of your citizens were able to use the ocean city's internet connection to tele-commute, you aren't going to have enough money.

I think this is just scratching the surface of issues you would have to face. Don't get me wrong, I am all for thinking outside the box like you have. I just think that the logistics would make it tough.

You're right there are real issues that would have to be taken into consideration and overcome but thats what this thread is for, i will have to have a look for it but im pretty sure i've seen a simple plastic device that will collect evaporated sea water for drinking, we can also collect and store rain water for plants, almost every problem has a solution, it's ok to point out problems but its even better to think about ways of solving them first before you stop and say it can't be done.

reply to post by upgrayedd


Being out in the middle of the ocean, the sun would be the most valuable tool. You can use evaporation to separate the salt from the ocean's water. Since space wouldn't be much of an issue in the middle of the ocean, you could probably set up a relatively massive distillation operation like that.

Another issue would be some way to control the movement of the city. I don't think you'd want to accidently float into the middle of the Phillipines or one of the poles accidentaly. With that problem comes the cost of fuel. One option that requires only electricity is Magnetohydrodynamic Propulsion, but being out in the ocean with readily available solar power electricity shouldn't be much of an issue.

reply to post by warbird03


I was thinking there must be loads of tiny uninhabited islands we could anchor to if need be, preferably something in a good location with warm and mostly calm weather?

12 Fantastic Floating Cities and Artificial Islands

Sealand has been around for a while, it's claim to fame is as an offshore "micro-nation" offering up the usual affairs (camouflage passports, questionable 'citizenship', even more questionable banking).

There another one that's a flotilla of old ships (believe it's called "freedom ship") that's permanently at sea, but I don't think it has any official recognition as a "country", and it has to be expensive to provision it.

Some more are here;
New Country Projects

The problem is, you can't just create a country, it has to be recognized (see www.escapeartist.com, otherwise you're just sitting out there in international waters and not protected by anyone. None of these man-made islands has ever been recognized as an actual nation.

Once again great idea but a lot of it would be living off of luck. Did anyone think of a hurricane or windy seas if you noticed the other videos they were inland with realatively calm seas if you start trying to tow something like that its going to rip apart. A hurricane will rip it apart. The tide will erode away all of your sand. Barnacles and other sealife will rapidly degredate the materials used to hold the island together even the plastic bottles degredate over time. Do yo want to be sleeping 1000,s of miles off shore when that thing starts to come apart or riding a 30 feet wave. Im a commercial fishermen ive been in on and around the sea for 30 years you do not want to be in the middle of the ocean shallow water or close to land only. Islands do not float they are connected to the sea floor and almost all deserted islands are owned by someone you can bet even less stroud is paying a rental fee to ruff it on the cook islands with sea rats. Just making suggestions though check with your local gov befoe you go to saving water bottles.

they build very big ocean liner.
and build oil rigs that anchor to the sea bed.
so just put the two together.
and then build a second one and add it.
I think a Big ring would be best.
as the centre would be stable.
you could use a nuclear reactor to power
a water still, using sea water.

reply to post by just theory


this was interesting, until bioshock came out. i dont wanna be a plasmid monkey :|
on a serrious note, there are already underwater vacation home type spots, but they are mega expensive to visit

reply to post by just theory


There are many reasons this won't work.

1) there may be uninhabited land but that land is still owned by someone and if it owned then they have an EEZ.(the US and Mexico claim 200 miles from shore as their EEZ I'm not sure about other countries.)

2) This island would have to be huge to withstand the pummeling of waves.

3) even if it was Huge(which I assume it would be to have enough land to support crops) then when storms come by your crops would be pummeled with seawater which would kill them because not many food crops are salt tolerant.

This is possible to do but in no way would it be done " rather cheaply" as you assume. This would cost hundreds of millions if not billions to do. You'd be better off taking that money and starting your own utopia in some third world country.

I'm not trying to be a naysayer here but I have worked on the Ocean my whole life and She's not one to be trifled with and sinks the biggest of state of the art vessels with impunity. Some lashed together plastic bottles wouldn't stand a chance.

For money there's always the option to get a solar panel to power computers, and do some web entrepreneuring!

The architect Eugene Tsui has worked on this same concept with large scale settlement in mind.

www.tdrinc.com...

Ca you help me out here. the first video said something about aluminium cans copper to make power? Is he talking about a air battery? Has anyone here done this?