We’ve run out of time, the non-profit Fabien Cousteau Ocean Learning Center says on its official website. And it’s true: unless we do whatever we can right now to study and safeguard our oceans, it may be too late for this extremely diverse and fascinating world.
The Fabien Cousteau Ocean Learning Center is founded and run by Fabien Cousteau, whose family name could possibly ring a bell: he is the grandson of famous ocean explorer Jacques-Yves Cousteau, himself not a stranger to the idea of building underwater habitats for research and educational purposes. Cousteau is proposing the biggest such habitat ever, Project Proteus.
Project Proteus was designed by industrial designer Yves Béhar and, should funding be secured in time, it would sit 60 feet (18.2 meters) underwater off the coast of the Dutch Caribbean island of Curacao. It would allow up to 12 researchers to live on-base for up to a month, and would include anything from various lab and research facilities to recreation areas, medical bays and storage areas, to bedrooms, kitchen and dining rooms, and even its own underwater garden, another world first. The greenhouse would come particularly in handy for residents, since they won’t be able to cook with an open flame.
Proteus is a massive double-decker, designed as such as a means to encourage physical activity among the members of the research team. It would sit on stilts that adapt to the changing seafloor, and would be powered by wind and solar energy from the surface and ocean thermal energy conversion. Because researchers would be able to work day in and day out without having to come up to the surface, it would be more efficient and convenient in terms of studying the world underwater, from the way it’s affected by climate change and pollution, to studying existing or discovering new marine species.
Spanning some 4,000 square feet (372 square meters), Proteus is being compared to the International Space Station as the ISS of the sea. Cousteau doesn’t rule out the possibility of using the habitat to help astronauts train for space missions. Much like the ISS, Proteus would also serve an educational purposes, so livestreams could take place from there.
“In many ways, Proteus is our generation’s Moon landing,” Costeau explains. “Before it was reality, the Moon landing was just a dream that hardly anyone thought could come true. I want to explore the oceans of Mars – but until we can go there and return safely, the Earth’s oceans still hold quite a few secrets that are the keys to our future.”
Project Proteus was designed by industrial designer Yves Béhar and, should funding be secured in time, it would sit 60 feet (18.2 meters) underwater off the coast of the Dutch Caribbean island of Curacao. It would allow up to 12 researchers to live on-base for up to a month, and would include anything from various lab and research facilities to recreation areas, medical bays and storage areas, to bedrooms, kitchen and dining rooms, and even its own underwater garden, another world first. The greenhouse would come particularly in handy for residents, since they won’t be able to cook with an open flame.
Proteus is a massive double-decker, designed as such as a means to encourage physical activity among the members of the research team. It would sit on stilts that adapt to the changing seafloor, and would be powered by wind and solar energy from the surface and ocean thermal energy conversion. Because researchers would be able to work day in and day out without having to come up to the surface, it would be more efficient and convenient in terms of studying the world underwater, from the way it’s affected by climate change and pollution, to studying existing or discovering new marine species.
Spanning some 4,000 square feet (372 square meters), Proteus is being compared to the International Space Station as the ISS of the sea. Cousteau doesn’t rule out the possibility of using the habitat to help astronauts train for space missions. Much like the ISS, Proteus would also serve an educational purposes, so livestreams could take place from there.
“In many ways, Proteus is our generation’s Moon landing,” Costeau explains. “Before it was reality, the Moon landing was just a dream that hardly anyone thought could come true. I want to explore the oceans of Mars – but until we can go there and return safely, the Earth’s oceans still hold quite a few secrets that are the keys to our future.”