Client: SEDIF (Syndicat des Eaux dIle de France)
Structural Engineering: YRM Anthony Hunt Engineers, France
Process Engineering: Vivendi - Compagnie Generale des Eaux
Landscape Architects: Latitude Nord
Commission: Public Works
Overall Building Area: 17,200 sq.m
Construction Cost: Ffr. 120m
Completed - August 1999
(with S'pace Architectes Associes & PH Montel)

Life Support - Water
This extension to the water treatment plant houses an innovative nanofiltration process. The plant supplies 300,000 homes in 39 towns north west of the Ile de France region, of which Paris is the centre. The total production capacity of the Mery sur Oise plant is 12 million ft of water per day.

Two types of building were developed for the extension to this plant; copper-clad hangars with glass facades, housing the nanofilters, and exposed concrete containers for the ancillary processes. The nature of each filtration stage, e.g. protected from ultra-violet rays or climate sensitive, affected the materials and design. The filtering stages were also separated a move that helped us reduce the impact on the landscape and their volumes integrated with the landscape design. In contrast to the existing shed, the new plant is legible from a distance and exhibits a major part of its processes to the public. All the buildings were sited and designed for future expansion.