Tag: Notre-Dame

One day after the blaze that scarred Notre-Dame, President Emmanuel Macron addressed a nation in shock at the damage to one of its great cultural landmarks, with a promise that rang as clearly as the peal of the cathedral’s bells.

“We will rebuild the cathedral even more beautifully and I want it to be finished within five years,” Macron said on national television on the evening of April 16, 2019.

“And we can do it,” he added.

But six months after the April 15 fire that tore through the roof of the 13th-century Paris cathedral and toppled its spire, the reconstruction process is shaping up to be much more complex than many anticipated.

Workers have had to clean up significant quantities of lead that melted from the roof and contaminated areas around the cathedral, with critics saying the authorities were slow to warn the public of the risks.

There remains no consensus on how the cathedral should look after reconstruction, with many experts wanting the spire to be rebuilt exactly like the original, and Macron arguing for an innovative solution.

Above all, the process of securing an edifice still at risk of collapse after the fire damage has taken precedence over any reconstruction.

Read:French lawmakers approve controversial bill to rebuild Notre-Dame

It is only at the end of 2020 that a complete check will allow architects to work out how to restore the cathedral. No reconstruction is expected to start before 2021.

– ‘Not scaremongering’ –

It is impossible at this stage to say “how much this is going to cost, how long this is going to last,” said Michel Aupetit, the archbishop of Paris.

Macron’s five-year goal would see the cathedral’s reconstruction completed in the spring of 2024, before Paris hosts the Olympic Games that year.

The top priority is to eliminate any risk to the vaulted ceiling, with the main danger coming from 500 tonnes of scaffolding that was erected around the fire for renovation work before the blaze.

The damage caused by just a single bar of scaffolding falling could prove irreparable, and the work to remove the structure will take several months.

“This is not scare-mongering. It is a physical reality,” said Christophe-Charles Rousselot, director general of the Fondation Notre-Dame, the charity that is overseeing the gathering of donations to the cathedral.

With regards to the spire, a late addition to the mediaeval cathedral designed by the 19th-century French architect Eugene Viollet-le-Duc, many see it as an integral part of the building.

“It needs to be rebuilt as it was before,” said Philippe Villeneuve, the architect in charge of restoring the cathedral, arguing that the sheer power of the spire integrated it with the mediaeval church.

His is backed by Viollet-le-Duc’s descendants and, according to opinion polls, the French public.

But the government has left open the possibility of an international competition for architects to design something new.

Read:Notre-Dame: How an underwater forest in Ghana could help rebuild a Paris icon

– ‘I feel orphaned’ –

Experts are also intensively researching the precise original architecture of the cathedral, so that when reconstruction begins it is as accurate as possible.

“Before 2010, we only have old-style surveys, plans that have been redrawn on numerous occasions which are very partial and very imprecise,” said Remi Fromont, one of the architects responsible for the site who is working on drawing up accurate plans.

Andrew Tallon, a Belgium-born scholar who died aged 49 in November 2018, carried out hugely valuable laser scans of the interior in 2010 that have proved an even more valuable legacy than he could have imagined.

“We know that we will have shortcomings. Not all the chapels were systematically scanned. There are still areas of doubt,” Fromont said.

In the aftermath of the fire, private individuals and above all rich French cooperations rushed to pledge hundreds of millions for the rebuilding of the cathedral.

There were concerns whether this funding would ever be realised.

But France’s richest man Bernard Arnault in September signed a formal accord over his pledge of 200 million euros ($220 million), as did the Pinault family for their promised 100 million euros.

A signing on another 100 million promised by the oil giant Total is awaited in October.

The consortium of fundraising groups behind the drive believes that 800 million euros ($890,000) can be raised in total, with over 616 million euros now either transferred or pledged.

But lovers of the historic masterpiece, be they tourists, architecture buffs or worshippers, may have to wait some time before Notre-Dame becomes theirs again.

“I have felt myself orphaned, it is like being in mourning,” said Michele Chevalier, 70, a regular at Notre-Dame who was at the service when the first evacuation took place.

“I still manage to pray, but it’s not the same.”

Source: France24

Wood from a vast underwater forest in Ghana could be used to rebuild Notre-Dame Cathedral after its spire and roof were consumed by a blaze in April.

Massive tropical trees have been submerged beneath Lake Volta since 1965 when the construction of Ghana’s Akosombo Dam flooded part of the Volta River Basin.

A Ghanaian company, which has government concessions to harvest this wood, believes that using it to rebuild Notre-Dame is more environmentally friendly than cutting down new trees.

Kete Krachi Timber Recovery argues that the wood is “much stronger” because it has been preserved from decay by the lake’s bog-like conditions, and has started to fossilise.

While some experts have described the proposal as a “genius solution”, others warn that it could have disastrous consequences for the ecosystem.

The company has submitted its proposal to the French government, arguing that using wood from Lake Volta would help restore Notre-Dame to its original state.

An estimated 1,300 trees, mainly oaks, were felled in the 12th Century to build Notre-Dame’s iconic frame and spire. The deforested area spanned 52 acres – the equivalent of 26 football pitches.

Read:Notre-Dame area sealed off in Paris as workers prepare to remove toxic lead

According to Bertrand de Feydeau, vice-president of French preservation group Fondation du Patrimoine, France no longer has giant oak trees of the same size and maturity that were used to build the original structure.

Francis Kalitsi, chairman and co-founder of Kete Krachi, agrees. “We don’t think they still have oak in these volumes for the construction of cathedrals,” he said.

“Whereas underneath the lake, you have typical African hardwoods that are similar to oak trees – their density may range from 650kg to 900kg per cubic metre. They are structural timbers which could be useful in the reconstruction.”

Kete Krachi already harvests the underwater timber using remotely operated machinery guided by video, sonar and GPS navigation. Most of the wood is exported to Europe, and some to South Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

The company says if commissioned, it would sell $50m (£39.5m) worth of wood to the French government. Its proposal has already been acknowledged by the ministry of culture.

Jérémie Patrier-Leitus from the French culture ministry told the BBC: “Right now we don’t know if the frame will be rebuilt in wood. We are in the process of securing the monument, and then we will have to rebuild the vault and the spire.

“Reconstruction will start once the structure of the monument is stabilised and preserved. We will study the different generous offers once we have confirmed the material used to rebuild the frame.”

Bog oak: A more durable wood

Dr Cathy Oakes, specialist in French and English medieval architecture and iconography at the University of Oxford, said the wood in Lake Volta could be similar to “bog oak”, which was widely used in medieval constructions and furniture, although not in the original Notre-Dame.

“Bog oak has similarly been exposed to water for a long period of time, so it’s stronger and more durable,” she said in remarks before her death this summer.

The shortage of oxygen and the acidic conditions of peat bogs and riverbeds help to preserve tree trunks from decay. The wood then begins to fossilise, making it significantly stronger.

Andrew Waugh, director of London-based sustainable architecture practice Waugh Thistleton Architects, said using African wood such as iroko from Lake Volta could be a “genius solution”.

“It would seem to be a great way of solving a problem and helping a poorer economy,” he said.

“Iroko is an incredibly durable, hard-wearing timber. It’s very stable. Unless there are any issues with decay from taking it out of the water, one would imagine it would be a great timber to work with.”

But what about the environment?

However, concerns have been raised about the possible negative impact harvesting wood from Lake Volta could have on the local ecosystem.

A report in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives said pulling trees from lake beds can pollute the water with sediment, thereby blocking the light needed by aquatic organisms to survive.

The trees also provide a habitat for fish and other wildlife. Uprooting them could disrupt the lake’s ecology, thereby threatening Ghana’s fishery industry – a lifeline for an estimated 300,000 fishing families.

Stephen Anani, a project officer at local NGO Friends of the Nation, told the BBC that removing underwater trees had led to a “sharp decline” in the number of fish in Lake Volta because they tend to breed around stumps.

“It’s destroying the habitat where fish lay their eggs,” he said. “Some of the fish are now endangered. If you speak to fishermen along the lake, they complain bitterly.”

Questions have also been raised about the carbon footprint associated with extracting the wood and transporting it from Ghana to France.

According to the International Maritime Organization’s third Greenhouse Gas study, maritime transport emits around 940 million tonnes of carbon dioxide every year and accounts for about 2.5% of global greenhouse gases.

Dr John Recha, a Nairobi-based climate scientist at the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, says harvesting the wood and transporting it to France could leave a “significant” carbon footprint.

“A ship typically uses a lot of fuel,” he told the BBC. “The machinery used on seas, oceans and lakes are also typically more complex and require more fossil fuels, which emit carbon into the atmosphere.”

Read:French lawmakers approve controversial bill to rebuild Notre-Dame

Kete Krachi maintains, however, that emission levels related to salvaging timber from the lake are “much lower” compared to emissions from cutting trees on land.

“The bulk of fuel consumption in felling trees is in log transport – and water transport is more energy-efficient than land transport,” Mr Kalitsi said.

Dr Tristan Smith, an energy and shipping expert at University College London’s Energy Institute, agrees that ocean shipping is normally considered the most efficient mode of transport in terms of greenhouse gas emissions.

However, he warned that pollution from shipping has not been as tightly regulated as other industries, so the plan to ship wood may not be as eco-friendly as might be assumed.

“Depending on the specifics of the route taken and the ships used, the greenhouse gas emissions from the sea voyage may be of a similar magnitude to that from the trucking used at either end of the voyage,” Dr Smith said.

Kete Krachi says the ships it plans to use would be travelling to France anyway on established trade routes, so it would contribute a “negligible” quantity of additional carbon into the atmosphere.

The company ultimately believes its potential involvement in rebuilding Notre-Dame would not only benefit Ghana’s economy but have a wider symbolic importance.

“It would mean we could play a role in an architectural feat that is a gift not only to France but to the world,” Mr Kalitsi says.

Dr Oakes agrees.

“In the end, it’s got to come down to practicalities of experience. But to think that the world is being invited to contribute towards the reconstruction of this building is great.”

Source: BBC.com