Designed by PTW Architects of Australia, the completely compelling "Water Cube" (Beijing National Aquatics Center) has a shell that's a mere 0.008 inch thick made from ETFE, a material that both insulates and transmits light. The design invokes the bubbles that form in sea foam.
• The Water Cube is the world's only public building fully made of a membrane structure and is the most complicated membrane system in any single project globally.
• The building uses solar energy to heat the pools and the interior area. All backwash water is filtered and returned to the swimming pools.
• The Water Cube is designed to act as a greenhouse. This allows high levels of natural daylight into the building and enables it to harness the power of the sun to passively heat the building and pool water.
• It is estimated that the sustainable design has the power to reduce the energy consumption of the leisure pool hall by 30 per cent.
• Twenty per cent of the solar energy falling on the building is trapped within the building and used to heat the pools and interior.
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