The Pearl-Qatar

zoom

Porto Arabia Marina at The Pearl-Qatar (Picture courtesy of Vicken Seropian).

CEO Middle East talks to Peter Bolton, head of Environmental Affairs for The Pearl-Qatar, a future world-class residential and tourist destination, about the environment and lifestyle.

One of the largest urban developments in Qatar, The Pearl-Qatar is achieving international recognition as the Middle East’s most prestigious and glamorous location, renowned for excellence in design and construction. With an area of 4 million sq m and a 32km coastline, this reclaimed island has been developed with funds in excess of QR 50 billion ($14bn). It is at once a residential destination and luxury resort, shaped by the vision to create an asset and a way of life with lasting quality and value: a jewel at the heart of the Gulf.

The first development in Qatar to offer freehold and residential rights to the international community, The Pearl-Qatar continues to attract unprecedented interest from buyers and investors in more than 52 countries.

On completion in 2012, it will accommodate more than 41,000 residents in 15,000 dwellings divided between 10 distinctive precincts. In and around them, exquisitely landscaped parks, state-of-the-art marinas and pristine beaches will vie with a captivating world of upscale shopping, dining and leisure opportunities to bring each unique neighbourhood to vibrant life. The Pearl-Qatar is owned and developed by United Development Company, one of Qatar’s leading public shareholding companies.

Dredging to create artificial islands is known to be very environmentally damaging. What measures were taken when creating The Pearl-Qatar to minimise this damage?

The Pearl Qatar did not use techniques which have been used elsewhere in the Gulf to reclaim land. Elsewhere, dredging spoil has been sprayed into place using the so-called “rainbowing” technique. Whilst this undoubtedly creates new land, the run off from the process is known to blight the seabed for kilometres around the operation. The Pearl-Qatar did it differently. We built a coffer dam (or bund) round the whole development. This ensured that all dredging run off was captured. Most infill was then taken from within the bunded area. Some dredging had to be done outside the bunded area, but it was done with great care.

We have re-examined these areas and discovered that the once disturbed sea grass beds are now between 60 percent and 90 percent re-vegetated.

United Development Company is heavily involved in land reclamation and construction by the sea. What is the company doing to minimise its ecological/environmental impact?

When you pile 16 million cubic metres of fill into the sea, it is certain you are going to change the environment.

The area which was to become The Pearl-Qatar was a sub-littoral mud flat inhabited by sea grasses, seaweeds, sponges, shrimps, worms, shellfish and snails. It has been replaced by a habitat consisting of 10km of rip-rap revetment 28km of sandy beaches and 19km of seawalls. The old inhabitants have moved back in, but they have been joined by black spot snapper, two-bar sea bream, one spot sea bream, blue crabs, pen mussels, spot back herring, and many more sessile species.

Print | Email | Discuss this article

| Share |

READERS' COMMENTS

Click here to post a comment

Add your Comment All posts are sent to the administrator for review and are published only after approval. ArabianBusiness.com reserves the right to remove any comment at any time for any reason. Please keep your responses appropriate and on topic. Arabian Business would like to point out that only comments relevant to the story will be published. Any containing personal insults or inappropriate language will not be approved.
Name *
Remember me on this computer
Email *	(Your email address will not be published)
City
Country
Subject *
Comment *
Notify me of further comments
Enter the words above *
Please click post only once - your comment will not be published immediately.

MORE FROM ARABIANBUSINESS.COM