Filter Island: plan
Project Location: Chicago, IL
This collaborative studio project proposed re-reversing the Chicago River and building a modular, floating, horizontal sub-surface-flow constructed wetland to clean the river water of sewage and chemicals before it enters Lake Michigan. Each filtering unit in the system consists of 7 connected cells with 2.2 acres of surface area. (131 filter units = 289 total acres of constructed wetland) Water flow through the system is powered by wind turbines connected to pumps, and the water cleansing work is done by plants via phytoremediation and rhizofiltration. Microbes that live in the root systems of the plants continue to clean water after the plants have gone dormant, and at the end of the cleansing process, the water is ready to enter the lake.
© Dena van der Wal |