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Monash Art, Design and Architecture Student Exhibition 2022

Ayden Fiore

As we are led to believe, the future of coal-fired energy generation hangs in the balance as the globe grapples with reducing emissions. In the Latrobe Valley, coal’s impending demise is being fast tracked as plans are made for a swift departure, in lieu of big batteries and mine pit lakes. But as coal mines are closing in Victoria, new mining operations around the country are being given the green light, as export-based approaches to extraction offer the industry an economic lifeline.

My project, ‘Climate Contradiction’, highlights the inconsistencies of recent industry trajectory through a speculative future, describing the implications of affording an afterlife for fossil fuels.

Professional Practice Award - Amount $1,000

Architects' Registration Board of Victoria - Professional Practice Award

Winner: The Peter Elliott Architecture + Urban Design prize for Drawing Architecture ($750)

Most accomplished drawings of architecture, from traditional through to new frontiers. This prize is about the love of drawing as a means of communicating ideas in any medium.
Endowed by Peter Elliott Architecture + Urban Design

Best in Studio: 'Energy Sites — Yallourn'

Most outstanding design project in the studio 'Energy Sites — Yallourn,' in the Master of Architecture

2022: Climate Contradiction

The project narrative is formulated with reference to the most striking of industry contradictions, the national shift towards Pit-to-Port coal. This implies an export-based approach to coal extraction, shipping the material abroad and passing on Australia’s emissions responsibilities in the process – our contribution to the climate crisis, long after our power stations are gone.

When considering trajectories like this, in conjunction with impending global shortages of oil and gas, Victoria’s 65BT of coal could be seen to have an uncertain future, which has had me asking the question…

Will this be the end of coal in the Latrobe valley?

2050: Automated Resistance

Operating within a future Latrobe Valley context and drawing from the evidence of an industry shift towards Pit-to Port coal, the first of 3 speculative accounts which make up the project, describes the beginning of a sinister plan to establish a privatised coal strong-hold.

Through commentary on the deliberate demise of the Latrobe Valley at the hands of AGL, the project, during 2050, details the initial autonomous construction of a future-proof coal mine, from the bottom of the Loy Yang pit lake.

2060: The Pit Port

Amidst a predicted drying climate, the project’s second speculative account details the re-ignition of coal extraction within the region, through the emergence of AGL’s coal strong-hold. Revealed as the lake dried up, the structure imposes its scale upon the landscape and exists as a direct translation of the material waste quantities, left behind by the Loy Yang Power Station.

The absurdities of the capitalist narrative begin to emerge as the AGL operation re-defines the Pit as the Port. Ships are dragged across the once pristine landscape to collect their cargo amongst the remnants of struggling Latrobe communities.

2070: Fortified Future

The project’s third and final speculative account represents the completion of the AGL Pit-Port within a largely unrecognisable Gippsland context. The operation in its completed form, represents a futureproofing of industry and private wealth, at the expense of everything beyond the immense walls of the facility – a physical juxtaposition of the disparity caused by extractive violence.

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