The world's first independent floating nation that operates outside of government regulations using its own cryptocurrency is set to launch by 2022. Photo / Blue Frontiers handout
The world's first independent floating nation that operates outside of government regulations using its own cryptocurrency is set to launch by 2022. Photo / Blue Frontiers handout
The world's first independent floating nation, which will launch in the Pacific Ocean in 2022, has begun selling the cryptocurrency people will need to use to buy property.
Backed by Peter Thiel, the plans will see the sea-bound city state, with 300 homes as well as a handful of hotels, restaurants, offices and more, built in the Pacific Ocean off the island of Tahiti, reports the Daily Mail.
Investors can now take part in a presale of Vayron, the cryptocurrency the Seasteading Institute, the organisation behind the plan, will use.
The scheme is the creation of the nonprofits Seasteading Institute and Blue Frontiers, which alongside Thiel's investment fund the project through philanthropic donations via tokens of their own cryptocurrency, Vayron.
The radical plans are expected to be completed by 2022 and cost as much as £37 million ($72m).
"Varyon (VAR) is expected to be required to purchase seasteads, fractional ownership of seasteads and seastead residency from Blue Frontiers," it said.
"The presale is available today for the first 4,000 ETH with bonuses from 5 per cent to 15 per cent. The public sale date is yet to be determined."
Varyon says a billion of the tokens will be issued, and says "No more tokens can ever be created".
The funds raised from the crowdsale will be used to implement the radical plans, with proceeds from the token sale are expected to be divided among the following activities: Design & Engineering SeaZone Legal & Administration Community growth General Administration.
Bankrolled by Peter Thiel, the pilot program in partnership with the government of Polynesia and is championed by a movement of academics, philanthropists and investors. Photo / Blue Frontiers handout
"We plan and expect that Varyon will be usable to purchase seasteads, fractional ownership of seasteads, seastead residency, and other products and services from Blue Frontiers," organisers said.
"As an easily exchangeable token, Varyon will also be tradable and usable beyond just Blue Frontiers."
Bankrolled by PayPal founder Peter Thiel, the £37m project is a pilot program in partnership with the government of Polynesia and is championed by a movement of academics, philanthropists and investors.
Building work on this isolated "utopia" will begin next year following the signing of an agreement with French Polynesia's government in 2017.
Joe Quirk, president of the Institute, told Business Insider that his team's vision has evolved beyond its initial vision to include a focus on climate change.
The group now also sees the city as a way to live with rising sea levels, which are expected to increase more than six feet by the end of this century.
In an interview earlier this year, Nathalie Mezza-Garcia, a political scientist and researcher for the Floating Island Project, says the island's residents will be free of "fluctuating geopolitical influences and trade issues" and claimed the nation could one day house refugees displaced by climate change.
Speaking to CNBC, Mezza-Garcia, a researcher at Warwick University, said: "There is significance to this project being trialed in the Polynesian Islands. This is the region where land is resting on coral and will disappear with rising sea levels.
"Once we can see how this first island works, we will have a proof of concept to plan for islands to house climate refugees."
The island's structures will feature "green roofs" covered with vegetation and construction will use local bamboo, coconut fibre, wood and recycled metal and plastic.
The scheme is the creation of the nonprofits Seasteading Institute and Blue Froniters. Photo / Blue Frontiers handout
It could see the creation of an independent nation that floats in international waters and operates within its own laws to "liberate humanity from politicians", according to the Seasteading Institute.
A number of the island's dozen non-residential buildings are designed to function as business centres, allowing companies to work outside of government regulations.
"This means there is stability, outside of fluctuating geopolitical influences, trade issues and currency fluctuations - it's the perfect incubator," Mezza-Garcia said.
She added that the project is an exciting prospect for those disenchanted with the politicial sphere of today.
"If you don't want to live under a particular government, people will be able to just take their house and float away to another island," Mezza-Garcia said.
The Seasteading Institute, co-founded by Paypal founder Peter Thiel, has spent the past five years creating designs for "permanent, innovative communities floating at sea", joining up with Blue Frontiers - a new startup that specialises in building floating islands - last year.
Blue Froniters released concept images of the French Polynesia project in December 2017.
The designs took inspiration from the rich Polynesian culture, in particular from traditional navigation, which is based on the observation and knowledge of natural elements.
In a written statement, a spokesman for the Seasteading Institute said: "During several visits to French Polynesia and after getting acquainted with the environment and the local contexts, one thing was sure, the project has to blend into its environment.
"To achieve this, local environmental characteristics, climate, ecology and cultural context have all been studied and play a major role in the process.
"The project, however, doesn't only want to not hurt the existing environment, the vision of the Blue Frontiers [is to] facilitate the development of more conscious and balanced settlements at sea where humans can peacefully coexist with the environment and with each other."
The overall shape of the construction reflected the pattern of a fish hook, an ancestral tool that symbolises the actions of the demigod Maui.
Hills and mountains, the shape of reefs and other underwater landmarks, as well as the rising and setting of the sun, moon and stars were reflected in the design.
French Polynesia, a collection of 118 islands in the southern Pacific, is interested in the project as the area is at risk from rising sea levels. Photo / Seasteading Institute handout
Small platforms with villas would be aligned to the path of the stars of the Sirius, or Rua faupapa, star system, according to the plans.
Larger platforms with mixed-use buildings aligned to the celestial pillar Pou, starting from the main platform, the "star headlight" or Ta'urua, and ending by the guide star Avei'a, passing through the zenith of the floating island.
Other elements of navigation were taken into account in the urban planning.
The larger platforms would be oriented according to the prevailing wind direction, in order to create calmer wave conditions behind them.
The project aims to include Polynesian culture in the design and detailing of buildings and other structures.
Local construction techniques and materials would be blended with modern technologies to fulfil contemporary needs while preserving continuity with tradition.
Speaking in November, Joe Quirk, president of the Seasteading Institute, said he wanted to see "thousands" of rogue floating cities by 2050, each of them "offering different ways of governance".
"Governments just don't get better," Quirk told the New York Times.
"They're stuck in previous centuries. That's because land incentives a violent monopoly to control it."
First revealed in January, the plans have been approved by the French Polynesian government, which is now creating a special economic zone so the floating nation can operate under its own trade laws.
The tiny nation, a collection of 118 islands in the southern Pacific with a population just over 200,000, has granted the Seasteading Institute 100 acres of beachfront to operate from.
French Polynesia is interested in the project as the area is at risk from rising sea levels.
