Shangri-La and Xanadu

Two perfect seeming places I want to visit

Abu Dhabi has started to build what it says is the world's first zero-carbon, zero-waste car-free city.

Masdar City will cost $22bn (£11.3bn), take eight years to build and be home to 50,000 people and 1,500 businesses.

The city will be mostly powered by solar energy and residents will move in travel pods running on magnetic tracks.

The city will make use of traditional Gulf architecture to create low-energy buildings, with natural air conditioning from wind towers.

Water will be provided through a solar-powered desalination plant, Masdar says. The city will need a quarter of the power required for a similar sized community, while its water needs will be 60% lower.

The city forms part of an ambitious plan to develop clean energy technologies.

In January, the government of Abu Dhabi announced a $15bn five-year initiative to develop clean energy technologies, calling it "the most ambitious sustainability project ever launched by a government".

As part of the plan, Abu Dhabi will become home to the world's largest hydrogen power plant.

The money is being channelled through the Masdar Initiative, a company established to develop and commercialise clean energy technologies, and Abu Dhabi hopes it will lead to international joint ventures involving much more money.

Abu Dhabi will invest $4bn of equity in the project and borrow some of the rest, Masdar said.

"We are creating an array of financial vehicles to finance the $22bn development," Masdar chief executive officer Sultan al-Jaber told Reuters news agency.

"We will monetise all carbon emission reductions... Such innovative financing has never been applied to the scale of an entire city."

Of course all of the money used to pay for this oasis in the desert will have come from oil revenues, but let's not worry about that part.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
-Coleridge

and in a less scary part of the world with a lot of fun things converging
Feeling singer Dan Gillespie revealed to us that singer Sophie Ellis Bexter is to start up a gay themed 80s club in London, inspired by David Bowie.
Gillespie, spilt the beans on the plans of the wife of his bassist, Richard Jones saying 28-year-old is in talks with the owners of the late Rebel Rebel gay night club.

80s? Sophie? Bowie? Buggers? Brits? I am totally there.
And I am really all about this club just as long as they promise to play this song.
For at least one straight hour. Each and Every night.

It's murder on the dancefloor
But you better not kill the groove
Dj, gonna burn this goddamn house right down
Oh, I know I know I know I know I know I know
About your kind
And so and so and so and so and so
I'll have to play
If you think you're getting away
I will prove you wrong
I'll take you all the way
Boy, just come along
Hear me when I say
Hey, It's murder on the dancefloor
But you better not kill the groove
Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey It's murder on the dancefloor
But you better not steal the moves
Dj, gonna burn this goddamn house right down
Oh I know I know I know I know I know I know
There maybe others
And so and so and so and so and so and so
You'll just have to pray
If you think you're getting away
I will prove you wrong
I'll take you all the way
Stay another song
I'll blow you all away
Hey, It's murder on the dancefloor
But you better not kill the groove
Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey Murder on the dancefloor
But you better not steal the moves
DJ, gonna turn this house around somehow
Murder on the dancefloor
But you better not kill the groove
Hey, hey, hey, hey
Murder on the dancefloor
But you better not steal the moves
Dj, gonna burn this goddamn house right down

(I LOVE THIS SONG)
Sophie Ellis-Bexter Murder on The Dance Floor [download]
Dj, gonna burn this goddamn house right down

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