Ivanpah Solar Sanctuary

The project begins from a documented conflict at the Ivanpah Solar Power Facility, where concentrated solar flux alters conditions for birds, insects, and desert ecologies. Mapping bird mortality around the heliostat fields frames the central question: how can discarded solar mirrors support desert habitat? Rather than adding new construction, the proposal repurposes the facility's own components — mirrors, fog nets, and minimal ground interventions — to redirect heat and moisture into shaded desert microhabitats.

The system reads as an atmospheric reprogramming of energy infrastructure. A six-stage water cycle — atmospheric moisture, fog capture, collection, storage, distribution, and microclimate habitat — transforms concentrated solar flux into a moderated gradient of mist and shade. In section, a fog net wrapped around the power tower sustains an atmospheric garden in which plants, birds, and visitors occupy overlapping climatic bands, calibrated to bird flight altitudes from kestrels near the tower's crown to cowbirds at the ground, where a sanctuary garden, water tank, and desert botanic garden complete the sequence. The work was developed as team research alongside an individual design project at Columbia GSAPP.