Coastal city greens up its act for horticulture event

As host, it is striving to be symbol of smart ecology

The ideals of ecology will be seen in every single tree, road and building, said Li Qun, Party chief of Qingdao, the host city of the 2014 International Horticultural Expo.

Six years after hosting the Olympic and Paralympic sailing events, the city will once again be the focus of the world's attention as the first Chinese coastal city to host an international horticultural expo.

The event will be a people-oriented gala integrating ecological concepts and world-class standards, said Li.

"The expo will be a presentation of harmony between human and nature," he said. "Gardening technologies and approaches will be showcased as much as possible to allow the visitors to interact with nature and get inspiration from it."

Under the theme "From the earth, for the Earth", the expo will be held in a venue covering an area of more than 240 hectares, beside which is a 55-hectare business and service district known as the Expo Village.

The venues are projected to be complete by October, and trial operations will begin at that time.

Expo planners are taking special care to preserve the city's natural beauty, cultural heritage and biodiversity, according to the local government.

The organizers said that they have paid attention to preserving natural resources and landscapes in the process of construction and used modern technologies to restore environments that had been previously damaged.

The restoration includes the famous tourism resort of the Laoshan Mountains.

Known for its high-quality granite, the place used to be home to many quarries, and the economy of many local villages was highly dependent on the stone business. But years of over-exploitation has resulted in heavy damage to the environment.

So, the government has taken measures to "repair the mountains in a natural way".

"We have taken too much from nature, and now it is time to pay back," said Li Fengli, secretary-general of the expo's executive committee.

A special concrete mixed with seeds is paved on the slopes to guarantee the strength of the surface of the mountains while the grass and bushes grow.

"We are repairing the environment in a natural way," said Li. "We have actually done much to make it look like we have done nothing at all."

Green technologies

There are also green technologies inside the venues.

With the help of mirrors, sunlight is introduced to places that it could not reach directly. Rainwater will be collected and reused. A unique power generation system is employed, using natural gas to generate electricity and simultaneously produce heating and cooling.

Many devices using solar power or recycled energy can also be seen in the venues.

Special bricks are used to pave the roads, which look solid but allow water to filter down very fast when it rains.

The architecture at the venues is "grown, rather than built", because most of it has been covered with vegetation, said the secretary-general.

"It doesn't look like just steel plus concrete," he said.

He also said that the eco-friendly concept that the expo represents can help accelerate the economic development of the region, especially in terms of infrastructure improvement.

Where the main venues stand today used to be backward villages without running water or sewage treatment systems, nor did they have gas and heat. But the expo has changed the situation rapidly, allowing the local people to transit from being villagers to urban residents and enjoy improvements to their quality of life.

xiechuanjiao@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 04/25/2013 page24)