THE FUTURE RUINS OF THE SAUÐÁRDALUR

from FUTURE ARCHIVES 2225 / VOL I / PORTFOLIO

ATMOSPHERIC FUTURES

Existing conditions of the Sauðárdalur Valley

The Sauðárdalsstífla is one of five dams that, since their comlpetion in the Autumn of 2006, have captured the power of the Jökulsá á Dal river to create the Hálslón storage Reservoir. What was once a highly dynamic and forceful landscape, carving valleys and braided rivers fom the glacier out to the sea, now feeds the production of power for the Kárahnjúkar Hydropower Plant. The remains of the north-easterly region of Iceland, which is known to have once been a far more lively landscape - acting as a refuge for poets and artists6, as well as ecologically in the form of extensive wetland and heathlands, fed routinely with glacial flour from jökaulhaups - is now a barren place, starved of water, nutrients and life.

Materiality and form of the Sauðárdalsstífla

In line with the inherently contrasting qualities of the landscape of Icelandthe land of ice and fire - the materiality and form of the Sauðárdalsstífla impose an urban-ness and rigidity upon an otherwise wildly dynamic landscape. The combination of concrete, loose stone and basalt, juxtaposed with the ebbs and flows of water create a sense of tension between humanimposed lines of forces against the natural desire for the landscape to shift. All the same, the the structure is monumental in scale, a reflaction of the Vatnajökull‘s natural monuments - mountains, volcanoes, glaciers - in the blue of the distance.

DELTAWERK / Landscape installation and ‘Hardcore Heritage’

The Atlas of drawings I created in study of RAAAF’s landscape project ‘Deltawerk’7 proved instrumental in the conceptual development of of my interventions for the dam site. Where I had originally thought to propose the decomissioning of the dam and renaturalisation of the Jökulsá á Dal river system, I imagined the reuse of materials would take on relatively formal and conventional forms: a wetland walkway, walls, and so on. However, my studies of ‘Deltawerk’, as well as RAAAF’s radical approach to preserving cultural heritage, so called ‘Hardcore Heritage’, sparked new ideas on how the landscape might transform in line with my conceptual notions of archives, memory, and the natural and atmospheric processes of the landscape itself. The irregular arrangements of the concrete pieces, the angled placement, as well as the monumental scale of the project, contribute not only to a unique, vast, and immersive landscape experience, they encourage a more unprogrammed use of the space.

I began to envision the decommisioning of the Sauðárdalsstífla as a design intervention for the creation of new ruins - the enduring structures transformed into monuments for the future that speak to urban glacial legacies. At the same time, the walkway could take on a more spontaneous form. In a manner comparable to glacial erratics, the concrete pieces of the dam might ‘land’, either through falling or placement, within the landscape. Once placed, they would be allowed to shift and eventually erode with the forces of the water released from the resevoir. The result is a walkway that continues to extend and transform with both the deconstruction of the dam and the changing energies of the landscape; which hopes to stimulate a higher engangement and sense of exploration or play within the landscape. As open-ended and continual a project, the experience of the ruins - both of the walkway and the dam itself - is ephemeral. Still, at any given time, one might be able to step into the ruined landscape and catch a glimpse of what once was, with possibilities to imagine what might yet be.

Exctraction of forms for decomissioning of the Sauðárdalsstífla

In order to develop a design for the decomissioning of the dam - as well as the future form of the new ruins - I turned once again to my drawing archives of the ‘Deltawerk‘ project. In tracing the patterns created by light and shadow, I extraced geometric shapes and angled lines to compose a design of destruction.

Proposed decomissioning of the Sauðárdalsstífla

The proposed choreography for the deconstruction of the structure takes cues from the Elwha and Glines Canyon dam rmoval project of 2011-2014 to employ the notch and release approach. The slow process of this method allows water to drain gradually and consistently from notches cut into the concrete. As the sediment trapped behind the dam flows downstream in a steady rate, the affected ecosystems downstream are allowed to adjust to the changes gradually8. The sediment influx, over several years, transforms the morphology of the river channels from a tendency to pool (as seen in the existing conditions map on page 37), towards a tendency to braid, as seen ubiquitously accross the outwash plains, valleys and coastlines of the Vatnajökull. These geomorphic alterations have significant ecological implications for the river system, supporting the community of organisms that make their home in the riverbed, and improving the habitat structure for birds, fish, insects, and more. Despite the vast scale of the proposed interventions to deconstruct the Sauðárdalsstífla, and the brutalism of the concrete materials and forms, it is the hope that this sensitive and careful approach will nurture the ecosystem of the valley, allowing it to flourish. A design of destruction juxtaposed with a narrative of rebirth: the rebirth of the Jökulsá á Dal river.