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UK's first amphibious house

Tuesday, 14 February 2012 1:56 PM

Britain's first amphibious house will be built on the banks of the Thames later this year after winning planning permission because it can adapt to flooding.

The home designed by Baca Architects is a building that rests on the ground on fixed foundations in normal conditions. Whenever a flood happens it rises up in its dock and floats, buoyed by floodwater.

According to the Daily Telegraph, the house will be built on an island in the Thames at Marlow in Buckinghamshire. The garden will act as a natural early warning system, with terraces set at different levels that will flood at different times and warn the occupants before flood water reaches a dangerous level.

The paper puts the estimated value of the home at £1.5m and says it will cost around 25 per cent more to build than a conventional house of a similar size. However, there should be big savings on the insurance bill.

Insurance is a major consideration for homes near rivers and the Association of British Insurers warned last month that up to 200,000 home owners could struggle to get cover when a voluntary agreement with the government comes to an end in June 2013.

The unusual design for the home, which will be just 10m from the bank of the river, won the backing of both the local authority and the Environment Agency because it was a replacement dwelling that reduced flood risk on the site.

London-based Baca has previously worked on projects in flood-prone New Orleans and Holland has also done research work for the government on climate change and flood-risk environments and climate adaptive neighbourhoods.

Baca director Richard Coutts said: "A resilient city must be adaptable and to be adaptable the built environment must innovate.

"Amphibious design is one of a host of solutions that can enable residents to live safely and to adapt to the challenges of climate change and we are very much looking forward to constructing the first example of this approach in the UK."

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