Paper short abstract:

In the Aberdeen Harbour Expansion Project, human engagements with non-human elements and forces are enriched by the globalised endeavours of contemporary civil engineering, all part of the Harbour’s plans to become a hub for renewable energies.

Paper long abstract:

The construction of maritime infrastructures combines, in intricate and enigmatic ways, social memories and future imaginaries (Harvey & Knox 2015: 6) along with the elements. In the case of the Aberdeen Harbour Expansion Project, the complex nature of human engagements with non-human elements and forces – earth and water in particular – is enriched by the globalised endeavours of contemporary civil engineering. This transformational civil engineering project is responsible for creating 1,400 metres of new quay at Nigg Bay; the process involves land reclamation, and the mobilisation of construction units, ‘caissons’, transported from the north east of Spain via the sea, as well as significant dredging operations in the bay, to create depth. With North Sea reserves nearing peak production, the project is part of the drive of Aberdeen Harbour’s plans to become a hub for renewable energies and economic diversification. As an anthropologist grounded in the study of migration and landscape in post-Soviet contexts, I bring an attention to the production of space; that is, an understanding of environment, whether 'natural' or built, entertains puzzling relations with past and present, in ways that conceal history ;human intervention on the coast here has a long and illustrious history – the Harbour was established 900 years ago, but its current appearance is largely the result of its reconfiguration – started in the 1960s by oil and gas This paper is fed by globalised engineering imaginaries as well as elemental experiences, the resistances of rock, the clanging of machinery and the unabating lament of the sea.