SOFIA ECO DEVELOPMENT
HUATULCO, MEXICO, 2004-2005
A SOLUTIONS ORIENTED APPROACH (IT IS HOW WE SEE THINGS THAT MAKES THEM ADVANTAGEOUS OR NOT), and a client fully committed to the project enabled the development of this 300 acre real estate venture, including and organic farm and ecological reserve.
The site had no access to utilities, but had a varied topography with over 100m difference in height, and a river flowing through it, along 1600 m, year round. The effect of the restorative earthworks, keyline design features, and appropriate technology, helped transform this site into an example of sustainable site design approach.
The first phase included eight dams, 6,000 m of infiltration swales, and a fruit orchard with over 5000 trees. A state of the art system pumps river water to a crater dug into a hill 45 m above. The whole orchard is then, gravity irrigated, and is an example of permaculture design in the tropics.
DESIGNING EVOLUTION INTO MATURITY
An extended environmental analysis including topography, aspect, wind, soils, vegetation, habitation, and hydrology, was the basis for the zoning of the site and for evaluating the potential of each area.
All structures were designed interdependently. Access roads, selection of building site, earth keyline dams, spillways, swales and irrigation ditches, plantings, use of covercrops, were all solved integrally. Eight interlinked irrigation dams were planned, and three were constructed in the first phase. The dam walls bridge zones that were previously inaccessible to vehilces, and 1300 m of infiltration swales were excavated and planted as erosion control and to store water in the soil.
CLEAN TECHNOLOGIES & FOREST ESTABLISHMENT
The river flows through the property, dropping 26m in its course. A state of the art ram pump system, based on Bernoulli’s principle, lifts water to a point 45 m higher than where the water originally started, using no fuel or electricity. An excavated and lined pond at the top of a nearby hill, called the Crater, holds one million liters for drip irrigation and other uses.
5,000 Rambutan trees (Nephelium lappaceum) were planted on contour, and just as many selected native trees will form a new diverse forest.
