New generations of smart and sustainable cities could provide answers to the urban problems created by climate change, according to international architects, tech giants and leading politicians. But Indonesia's plan to relocate its capital some 800 miles from Jakarta, to a new purpose-built capital on the island of Borneo, will provide an exacting test for such innovation.
As sea levels rise, Jakarta is sinking. The city is subsiding up to 20 centimetres annually due to over-extraction of groundwater from the swamp-like terrain beneath. Located on the circum-Pacific seismic belt, a zone along the rim of the Pacific Ocean known as the Ring of Fire for its frequent earthquakes and tsunamis, 40 per cent of the city is now below sea level.
Jakarta, home to ten million and choked by gridlock and seasonal smog, has been hit by increasingly frequent flash floods, which killed 66 people in one week in January.