March 20, 2015 UT-ORNL Governor’s Chair Philip Enquist to Design New Egyptian Capital City

Philip Enquist, FAIA, the Governor’s Chair for Energy + Urbanism, has been selected to lead a team in the design of Egypt’s new $45 billion dollar capital city. Enquist, the Partner in Charge of the Skidmore, Owing & Merrill (SOM) City Design Practice, will work with Daniel Ringelstein, Director of Urban Planning in SOM’s London office, and George J. Efstathiou FAIA, RIBA Consulting Managing Partner, and SOM city planners to develop the initial framework and core principles of the sustainable new city.

The team was announced during the Egyptian Economic Development Conference held in Sharm El Sheikh in March 2015. The urban development project is intended to aid pressure on Cairo’s infrastructure, offering solutions to a population that is expected to double by 2050.

Enquist has confirmed that elements of this urban planning effort will be included in activities and research of the Governor’s Chair Studio.  Enquist is the sixteenth Governor’s Chair. He and his research team, designers at SOM who specialize in sustainable urbanism and carbon neutral cities, are leveraging intellectual capital, design expertise, and scientific capacity to conduct forward-looking experiments that focus on the vast, complex, and urgent issues that face cities and the natural environment.

Funded by the state of Tennessee and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Governor’s Chair program attracts top researchers to enhance research partnerships that exists between the state’s flagship university and the nation’s largest multi-program laboratory. Enquist’s five-year appointment through the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, College of Architecture and Design is an unprecedented collaboration between government, academia and industry. It is presently identifying territories for collaborative research, including those abroad in Egypt and beyond, that extend design and technological expertise from Knoxville to the world.

To learn more about the Governor’s Chair Program visit its UT-ORNL partnership page, and follow the hashtag #GCUrbanEnergy for collective sharing from SOM, ORNL, and the UT College of Architecture and Design.