Vabbinfaru Lotus

The Lotus was built between November 4 and 13, 2001, and powered on November 15, 2001; the structure began to turn white the next day, with limestone growth. Designed and built by Wolf Hilbertz, Tom Goreau and Abdul Azeez Abdul Hakeem, its frame was carried by around 40 volunteers through the shallow lagoon to the outer slope. It is an electric reef: about 600 W arrive through four 225 m cables from transformers on the jetty, and the current makes limestone grow over the steel. It also works as a coral nursery, with fragments rescued from the Vabbinfaru reef itself: 33 of the roughly 50 coral genera known from the Maldives have been transplanted, including Montipora, Acropora, Astreopora and Pocillopora.