The London Development Agency has asked eco-architect Bill Dunster to help deliver a landmark zero-carbon project in the Thames Gateway.

The plan for a low-carbon "eco-city" in the capital, predicted in Building on 3 March, was announced by London mayor Ken Livingstone last week.

The LDA is working with consultant Arup and environmental campaign charity Greenpeace to deliver the project, which will be situated on one of the sites Arup is already working on in the Thames Gateway.

The development, which will demonstrate that major developments can be designed to exemplary sustainable standards, will be based on the Dongtan eco-city in China.

Dongtan, which is currently being developed under the guidance of Arup director Peter Head, aims to be as close to carbon-neutral as possible.

Head told Building that he was hoping to pin down a specific site for the Thames Gateway project in the next few weeks.

He said: "We want to use a site that is already progressing through planning. Arup, along with Bill Dunster, who the LDA has asked us to involve, will take the scheme into planning and then look for a development partner. "The objective is to show that it is a commercially attractive proposition to developers."

The London project, which stems from a proposal by Greenpeace, will be up to 1000 units in size.

Dunster was the architect of seminal zero-carbon project BedZed in Sutton, Surrey, which at 84 homes is Britain's largest zero-energy development to date.

Head said: "The objective of this development will be the same [as BedZed] but the scale will be much larger. With scale comes the opportunity to make the most of renewable technology."

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