Georgswerder landfill
The Georgswerder landfill is a disused garbage dump in Georgswerder in the Hamburg district of Wilhelmsburg , whose garbage dump was transformed into the Georgswerder energy mountain by the landscape architects Häfner / Jimenez in 2013 as part of the IBA Hamburg International Building Exhibition .
geography
The approximately 45 hectare large and 40 meter high landfill with a volume of around seven million cubic meters is located on the Elbe island of Wilhelmsburg (to which the island of Georgswerder now belongs), immediately southwest of the Hamburg-Süd motorway junction with the federal highways 1 , 252 and 255 . As marshland, the terrain has a continuous layer of clay that prevents the surface water from seeping into deeper soil layers.
history
The mountain of rubbish
Until around 1930, the later landfill site was mainly used as an agricultural area. Then a small hill was first filled up, on which there was a flak position in the war years up to 1945 .
In the post-war years, from 1948 onwards, the rubble from the destroyed city of Hamburg was first dumped here. Waste and household waste were then stored and, from 1967 onwards, highly toxic industrial waste such as dioxins and other barrels with hazardous waste were added. From 1967 to 1974 around 200,000 tons of hazardous waste were deposited in liquid basins and barrel storage facilities. Some of this hazardous waste contains the extremely poisonous “ Seveso dioxin ”. In 1979 the landfill was closed. In 1983 it was found that the particularly dangerous dioxins were in the leachate from the landfill, which also ended up in the groundwater. In December 1983, Hamburg's Senator for the Environment, Wolfgang Curilla , confirmed that the plant protection agent Parathion (E605) was also being stored in the disused landfill, in addition to the highly toxic dioxins . The waste from Hamburg was in the following years, including at the - at that time the GDR - owned landfill Schönberg in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern disposed of.
The seal
Since 1986, security measures to seal the landfill have been carried out in various phases, the costs for this amount to around 95 million euros. The landfill was finally closed with a 2 to 3 meter thick, multi-layer landfill cover made of plastic sheeting and till to prevent the further flushing of toxins through the rainwater entry. Between 1992 and 2004, four wind turbines with a total nominal output of 2,650 kW were initially built on the sealing, which are intended to lower the operating costs of the landfill through income from renewable energies, especially since the hill in the otherwise flat landscape is a suitable location. Since structural interventions in the landfill are not permitted, the wind turbines were built on flat concrete slabs.
The groundwater must continue to be protected from the poisons of the already contaminated groundwater by technical measures and the seepage water collected around the landfill must be treated in a treatment plant. The methane gases produced by the decomposition processes of household waste are also monitored and discharged. 39 gas wells have been in operation since 1986, supplying the extracted gases to the Aurubis copper smelter as a substitute for natural gas for energy recovery. Since there is no new entry from waste, the output from decomposition is falling.
After the cover was completed in 1995, parts of the area were planted with native woody species and other open areas were released for encroachment. Valuable biotopes with rare plant species and numerous bird species have developed on the landfill site. In the summer of 2002, an area of around 14 hectares to the south of the landfill around the local brick ponds with grassland, ponds and reeds was upgraded with nature conservation measures to compensate for the habitats destroyed during the landfill rehabilitation.
Energy mountain Georgswerder
In addition to the landfill's landmark, the wind park with four wind turbines , which can be seen from afar, a photovoltaic system up to 10,000 square meters in size was installed on the southern slope , operated by Hamburg Energie . The first construction phase with an output of 497 kWp (kilowatt peak) was built in 2009, followed by a second phase with 405 kWp in 2011. The meadow cut should also be used to convert it into biogas. The energy mountain supplies around 4,000 households with electricity with wind power and solar energy.
In June 2010 an IBA stele was unveiled on the mountain, identifying the location as an IBA project and providing information about the “Georgswerder Energy Mountain”, which is intended to set an example for Hamburg as a “city in climate change”. In addition to the previously existing energy generation measures, three of the wind turbines were replaced by a more powerful module (repowering).
On March 24, 2013, parts of the mountain were opened to the public. There is an information center on the north side of the landfill. From there, paths lead up to the mountain, the upper part of which is surrounded by a 900-meter-long “horizon path” - the main idea behind the design. This is located, partly nestling against the mountain, partly constructed on steel supports, always exactly at a height below the summit. The outside of the horizon path railing is illuminated with LEDs in the dark.
Information center and multimedia exhibition
The new information center is located to the left of the entrance area at the foot of the energy mountain. There the history of the creation and use of the energy mountain is documented in a small exhibition and explained on the model. To this end, the quarter-hour multimedia film "The Tamed Dragon" was produced to clearly illustrate this development. There are five guided tours on the circular route every week. From the circular path there is an unusual perspective of the Hamburg skyline. The energy mountain is open to the public from April 1 to October 31, every day except Mondays from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. In winter it is closed for safety reasons (ice formation on the rotor blades).
Since autumn 2014, the “Horizontweg” marathon has been taking place on the flat circular path around the hilltop on the first weekend in November and last weekend in March.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c How can a mountain of rubbish be an opportunity for the city? - History (PDF; 4.5 MB) at iba-hamburg.de, accessed on September 9, 2013.
- ↑. Mountain Guide for the Horizontweg, Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, Authority for Urban Development, Hamburg 2013
- ↑ a b Energy Mountain: The Tamed Dragon. at ndr.de, accessed on September 9, 2013.
- ↑ a b Energieberg Hamburg . 2013 in the online exhibition 100 years of landscape architecture by the bdla . Retrieved May 2, 2014.
- ↑ Die Welt: Building exhibition opened in Hamburg . Retrieved March 24, 2013.
- ^ Claus Dahms: Horizontweg Marathon Hamburg 2014. In: Runners World. November 6, 2014, accessed October 19, 2016 .
- ↑ Christian Hottas: 5th Horizontweg Marathon & Half Marathon. In: Race Result. Retrieved October 19, 2016 .
Web links
- Georgswerder landfill (with various subpages) on hamburg.de
- Nature conservation at the foot of the Georgswerder landfill on hamburg.de
- Energieberg Hamburg : Year 2013 in the online exhibition 100 years of landscape architecture by the bdla
- Publications on the Georgswerder landfill (several PDF) on hamburg.de
- IBA Hamburg - Energieberg Georgswerder on iba-hamburg.de
- Hamburger Abendblatt from May 23, 2003: Old landfill becomes IGA-Berg on abendblatt.de
Coordinates: 53 ° 30 '36 " N , 10 ° 1' 45.9" E