Discussion Global Warming

[Ramen]

If sea levels are rising.

I like the idea of pumping water into middle eastern deserts to terraform sand dunes into tropical forest.

An excess of water, in the form of rising tides can be a good problem to have.

Do you deny climate change?

 

[Sanity Check]

Do you deny climate change?

Answered in #17 on page 1.

Discussion - Global Warming

This thread is solely just for the broad discussion of it as a whole Maybe some things if anybody is interested might wish to discuss could be... 1. Is Global Warming even real? (What do you think?) 2. Is it economically feasible for countries today to invest in developing cleaner sources of...

mangahelpers.com

 

[Ramen]

Answered in #17 on page 1.

Discussion - Global Warming

This thread is solely just for the broad discussion of it as a whole Maybe some things if anybody is interested might wish to discuss could be... 1. Is Global Warming even real? (What do you think?) 2. Is it economically feasible for countries today to invest in developing cleaner sources of...

mangahelpers.com

Oh thank god.

 

[Brandish μ]

Pumping saltwater??

 

[Sanity Check]

Pumping saltwater??

Pumping salt water into an artificial pond.

The sun naturally evaporates it, transforming it into fresh water and rain.

Leaving behind deposits of sea salt that can be used for cooking purposes.

 

[Brandish μ]

Pumping salt water into an artificial pond.

The sun naturally evaporates it, transforming it into fresh water and rain.

Leaving behind deposits of sea salt that can be used for cooking purposes.

Is this pond in the desert too? I'm struggling to see how this could work, but okay.

 

[Sanity Check]

Is this pond in the desert too? I'm struggling to see how this could work, but okay.

A decent percentage of rain comes from trees sucking water, from the ground through their roots, evaporating it from their leaves.

Water and rain are one part of the cycle.

Its necessary to have sufficient plants and trees to evaporate water to generate rain for the cycle to be sustainable.

Growing plants and trees in desert regions is a process known as afforestation. There are africans and indonesians famous for planting thousands of acres of forest on their own. Those are the unsung and real heroes of climate change afaik.

 

[Brandish μ]

A decent percentage of rain comes from trees sucking water, from the ground through their roots, evaporating it from their leaves.

Water and rain are one part of the cycle.

Its necessary to have sufficient plants and trees to evaporate water to generate rain for the cycle to be sustainable.

Growing plants and trees in desert regions is a process known as afforestation. There are africans and indonesians famous for planting thousands of acres of forest on their own.

Well a few things are a little off but I get what you're trying to say. I don't know if saline rainwater is the answer, though, which is what you're proposing. Soils in deserts are poor quality, generally, made worse with salt most of the time.

 

[Sanity Check]

Well a few things are a little off but I get what you're trying to say. I don't know if saline rainwater is the answer, though, which is what you're proposing. Soils in deserts are poor quality, generally, made worse with salt most of the time.

Coastal desalination plants routinely convert salt water to fresh water. Its not an issue that would require new technology to solve.

In the case of the african who single handedly planted thousands of acres of forest. His solution to mass growing trees in low quality soil was to dig a hole. Drop manure in it. And put the seed in the manure. Shit seemed to work. No pun intended.

Decomposing leaves and organic matter are the main necessary ingredients to improving the quality of soil for plants. Virtually all of which can be obtained through kitchen scraps and trash people normally throw away.

There's a lesser known aspect to this story where organic matter in landfills can lead to significantly increased methane and greenhouse gas emissions. Countries like korea are known for recycling food and organic wastes for farming purposes, which greatly helps them to reduce environmentally damaging emissions.

 

[Brandish μ]

Coastal desalination plants routinely convert salt water to fresh water. Its not an issue that would require new technology to solve.

In the case of the african who single handedly planted thousands of acres of forest. His solution to mass growing trees in low quality soil was to dig a hole. Drop manure in it. And put the seed in the manure. Shit seemed to work. No pun intended.

Decomposing leaves and organic matter are the main necessary ingredients to improving the quality of soil for plants. Virtually all of which can be obtained through kitchen scraps and trash people normally throw away.

There's a lesser known aspect to this story where organic matter in landfills can lead to significantly increased methane and greenhouse gas emissions. Countries like korea are known for recycling food and organic wastes for farming purposes, which greatly helps them to reduce environmentally damaging emissions.

In basic terms, install the water line/s, pump stations, desalination plants and evap ponds in the desert, away from everything, then have people run this infrastructure, who are not there in the desert. At the scale likely similar to a small rainforest for it to be worth it. If this can even work, the cost would be crazy.

Well, decomposing leaves are essential, which means you need soil organisms first... you don't really find many out in the desert, apart from some ants and stuff which are important. But I suppose if you cherry picked places where it's not exactly a desert and the soil wasn't so bad, it could work.

Anyway, I will leave it at that.

 

[hokageji]

If sea levels are rising.

I like the idea of pumping water into middle eastern deserts to terraform sand dunes into tropical forest (afforestation).

An excess of life giving water, in the form of rising tides can be a good problem to have.

It seems like a novel idea but then it begs the question, why do we not see it happen? In fact, we actually do see it happen. UAE and a lot of other countries have desalination plants, that actually convert seawater to potable water for their consumptions.

Also, the real chicken and egg is what came first, the forest, or the rain?

The reason rainforests form is because it gets a lot of rain. However, the reason it rains is because of the rainforests, check the satellite view of rainforests and you'll see. So the idea of pumping sea water into the lake is all nice, but you'd need an equivalent of a forest for that water to rain down in the same neighborhood. Otherwise, the water vapor is carried by the wind and may even end up in the ocean, where most of the rain water ends up anyways. So
you'd need an equivalent of a forest to support this which would mean terraforming the desert and that would mean a lot more water after which it may take years.
So your idea needs a little more thigns to add up, but it still isnt an instant thing.

Also, terraforming is a big problem and can have big impacts. lets take middle east as an example, if say a large enough area is selected to create rainforest, or rather make it rain, then its potentially stealing water vapor from neighbouring areas. This could mean Pakistan and India could see lower rainfall potentially and you end up creating deserts there. So the plan while seems novel, might be extremely hard to achieve. Besides that, we are not taking into account the cost of pumping water into the desert to do something that happens in the oceans alreadys.

I believe i have said this before, but the fact is that solving a problem with a new technology may not be the best solution. Tech will take time, and comes with its own challenges. Like for instance, one way to reduce pollution caused by automobiles is to replace them with electric. but Ecars are costly, batteries are costly and govt has to provide huge subsides to encourage population to purchase them. However, the carbon footprint associated with the manufacturing of an electric car is huge as well, which makes offsetting the usage or perks of using electric to 5 years (or less) before you are causing less harm. Instead, if the country built a strong public transport infranstructure to support 80% of the population's travel needs, the pollution will drastically reduce and wastage is low and the offset would be easier. Also, government can easily reuse the infrastructure as well....

 

[Sanity Check]

In basic terms, install the water line/s, pump stations, desalination plants and evap ponds in the desert, away from everything, then have people run this infrastructure, who are not there in the desert. At the scale likely similar to a small rainforest for it to be worth it. If this can even work, the cost would be crazy.

Once I tried to google how much sea levels would rise if all of the ice in antarctica melted.

I think the answers I got were between 100 feet and 400 feet.

This is just me but I think terraforming deserts in the middle east would be more fun than a 100 to 400 foot increase in sea levels.

Well, decomposing leaves are essential, which means you need soil organisms first... you don't really find many out in the desert

Microbes are in the air everywhere. What would slow them in a desert is lack of moisture. Mummification like that ancient egyptians practiced only works if moisture is barred and dehydration is maintained. Microbes similar to those that decompose a corpse would also decompose leaves providing food for plants. AFAIK anyways. Feel free to disagree errybody.

But I suppose if you cherry picked places where it's not exactly a desert and the soil wasn't so bad, it could work.

It could become a necessity eventually thanks to the planet losing arable land every year.

A sharply growing population while our quantity of arable land shrinks annually isn't the best outlook for future.

It seems like a novel idea but then it begs the question, why do we not see it happen? In fact, we actually do see it happen. UAE and a lot of other countries have desalination plants, that actually convert seawater to potable water for their consumptions.

Also, the real chicken and egg is what came first, the forest, or the rain?

The reason rainforests form is because it gets a lot of rain. However, the reason it rains is because of the rainforests, check the satellite view of rainforests and you'll see. So the idea of pumping sea water into the lake is all nice, but you'd need an equivalent of a forest for that water to rain down in the same neighborhood. Otherwise, the water vapor is carried by the wind and may even end up in the ocean, where most of the rain water ends up anyways. So
you'd need an equivalent of a forest to support this which would mean terraforming the desert and that would mean a lot more water after which it may take years.
So your idea needs a little more thigns to add up, but it still isnt an instant thing.

Also, terraforming is a big problem and can have big impacts. lets take middle east as an example, if say a large enough area is selected to create rainforest, or rather make it rain, then its potentially stealing water vapor from neighbouring areas. This could mean Pakistan and India could see lower rainfall potentially and you end up creating deserts there. So the plan while seems novel, might be extremely hard to achieve. Besides that, we are not taking into account the cost of pumping water into the desert to do something that happens in the oceans alreadys.

I believe i have said this before, but the fact is that solving a problem with a new technology may not be the best solution. Tech will take time, and comes with its own challenges. Like for instance, one way to reduce pollution caused by automobiles is to replace them with electric. but Ecars are costly, batteries are costly and govt has to provide huge subsides to encourage population to purchase them. However, the carbon footprint associated with the manufacturing of an electric car is huge as well, which makes offsetting the usage or perks of using electric to 5 years (or less) before you are causing less harm. Instead, if the country built a strong public transport infranstructure to support 80% of the population's travel needs, the pollution will drastically reduce and wastage is low and the offset would be easier. Also, government can easily reuse the infrastructure as well....

I live in an area with invasive plants. Many produce berries or fruit that are eaten by birds, rats, etc.

The birds travel miles and poop out seeds of the berries/fruit they ate. Which spreads invasive plants everywhere making them impossible to contain.

Would guess events like this occur naturally everywhere. There already are natural mechanisms for spreading plant life in a desert. The main ingredient missing is water.

That's something I don't know a whole lot about & an interesting topic I would like to see gain more exposure.

 

[Brandish μ]

I know I said I'd stop, but this idea is pie in the sky.

You can't just plunk all the water gained by oceans due to glacial melting in our deserts. Or, you can't plunk a feasible amount of seawater in the desert and think it helps at all...

Spoiler

That middle bar, 1.2% vs 68.7%. And the 1.2% isn't total amount of water in rainforests... but how can 1.2% even stack remotely close to 68.7%?

It can't.

And even if it could, so many other problems arise that I know for a fact cannot be handled in the proposed scenario...

 

[Sanity Check]

• An acre of forest will absorb more than 1 ton of carbon per year
• The arabian desert alone is 900,000 square miles
• 639 acres in 1 square mile
• 900,000 * 639 =

= 575,100,000 tons of additional carbon could be absorbed (sequestered) every year if the arabian desert alone were converted to tropical forestland.

In addition to this, covering sand with plant life would reduce the heat island effect of the region. Producing lower average temperatures.

The aim of the proposal isn't to displace all water in rising tides. Its to reverse negative trends associated with global deforestation.

...

Rather than blame meat producers for cutting down trees & "worsening" the environment -- we could plant more trees.





People talk about terra forming mars or the moon. So that people might someday live there.

Our first step towards achieving these goals is terra forming someplace like the middle east.

 

[Brandish μ]

The aim of the proposal isn't to displace all water in rising tides. Its to reverse negative trends associated with global deforestation.

You brought it up as an additional benefit.

In addition to this, covering sand with plant life would reduce the heat island effect of the region. Producing lower average temperatures.

What magic would you use to alter land cover from pure sand to vegetation?

People talk about terra forming mars or the moon. So that people might someday live there.

Our first step towards achieving these goals is terra forming someplace like the middle east.

We've done terra forming on planet earth to catastrophic effect, too. We just don't call it that, because it's not fantasy when you destroy the environment.

But if you could terra form in a positive way... it wouldn't be 'creating rainforest' in a desert... not without technology that would look like magic in 2021.

 

[Sanity Check]

What magic would you use to alter land cover from pure sand to vegetation?

Leaf and plant waste that would normally go to a landfill.

Would be ground up and turned into mulch. Then layered over desert sand. To produce a more suitable environment for plants. If pumping ocean water into the location wasn't a good option. Producing plant water through passive condensation and other measures could be pursued.

Sculptures which passively condense water from air could be placed at strategic locations in a desert to get the ball rolling.

It would take time. As with many problems in the world, people have never seen a serious or legitimate effort to define or fix these problems. The bar of our expectations is far lower in contrast to what is possible in this day and age.

 

[Brandish μ]

It would take time. As with many problems in the world, people have never seen a serious or legitimate effort to define or fix these problems. The bar of our expectations is far lower in contrast to what is possible in this day and age.

No, "it takes time" is not the excuse. The fact that it cannot be done is the reality of it. You're thinking only about the idea of it working, which is a very human fault, like when people focus on improving themselves they fantasise the end rather than focusing on the hard work that is right in front of them. It's not just about time. The amount of machinery, manpower, fill etc needed for this idea is beyond practical calculation tbh.

This is one of the gripes I have with all these global warming ideas and think tanks. Like, for a second just consider what has happened thru history. Solar energy is somewhat considered viable for homes these days. And why? It wasn't because of the science, or environmental benefit, or tree huggers reaching the hearts of people. It came down to dollars and feasibility, solar panels are cheap asf these days, most grids can take electricity from solar etc. And the point I'm trying to make is not 'money rules the world'... it's that people who support climate change mitigation are always promoting it, always trying to educate everyone about carbon footprint and all that shit, always taking the moral high ground. But if they really wanted to optimise their approach, to get people to think the way they do, which is the aim, then they should practice better negotiating. Which is common sense, but often lost. I feel sorry for a lot of good scientists doing great work who have to navigate the romanticism of 'clean ideas' and how they're carried out in all forms of media.

 

[Sanity Check]

No, "it takes time" is not the excuse. The fact that it cannot be done is the reality of it. You're thinking only about the idea of it working, which is a very human fault, like when people focus on improving themselves they fantasise the end rather than focusing on the hard work that is right in front of them. It's not just about time. The amount of machinery, manpower, fill etc needed for this idea is beyond practical calculation tbh.

This is one of the gripes I have with all these global warming ideas and think tanks. Like, for a second just consider what has happened thru history. Solar energy is somewhat considered viable for homes these days. And why? It wasn't because of the science, or environmental benefit, or tree huggers reaching the hearts of people. It came down to dollars and feasibility, solar panels are cheap asf these days, most grids can take electricity from solar etc. And the point I'm trying to make is not 'money rules the world'... it's that people who support climate change mitigation are always promoting it, always trying to educate everyone about carbon footprint and all that shit, always taking the moral high ground. But if they really wanted to optimise their approach, to get people to think the way they do, which is the aim, then they should practice better negotiating. Which is common sense, but often lost. I feel sorry for a lot of good scientists doing great work who have to navigate the romanticism of 'clean ideas' and how they're carried out in all forms of media.

How Egypt is growing forests in middle of the desert

Amid the success of the Serapium Forest, a massive plantation in Egypt, the country is now looking to plant more desert lands with trees as part of plans to fight climate change.

www.al-monitor.com

Did I mention africans and indonesians who planted hundreds if not thousands of acres of forest in desert regions a few posts back?

This isn't a vaporware pipe dream lacking proof of concept. They're actual things people have done over the past 10+ years.

Man Succeeds Where Government Fails: He Planted a Forest in the Middle of a Cold Desert

This intrepid old man retired from his career in bureaucracy so he could cultivate a lush green oasis in the middle of Himachal Pradesh.

www.goodnewsnetwork.org

Climate change is very politicized which makes things difficult.

 

[Brandish μ]

How Egypt is growing forests in middle of the desert

Amid the success of the Serapium Forest, a massive plantation in Egypt, the country is now looking to plant more desert lands with trees as part of plans to fight climate change.

www.al-monitor.com

Did I mention africans and indonesians who planted hundreds if not thousands of acres of forest in desert regions a few posts back?

This isn't a vaporware pipe dream lacking proof of concept. They're actual things people have done over the past 10+ years.

Man Succeeds Where Government Fails: He Planted a Forest in the Middle of a Cold Desert

This intrepid old man retired from his career in bureaucracy so he could cultivate a lush green oasis in the middle of Himachal Pradesh.

www.goodnewsnetwork.org

Climate change is very politicized which makes things difficult.

They're planting, which is great. They're at how many hectares? Terra forming is just around the corner then, on par with deforestation numbers...

Planting over 200 hectares is not the pie in the sky ideas you've proposed. I quite like these initiatives in all honesty, but the concept is not on the same scale at all, which is where you completely miss.

 

[kkck]

Even "terraforming" the sahara would still imply a huge fuck you to the flora and fauna that is actually there. Even if we ignore that the only answer we have today regarding how this would be done can be coherently summed up to "magic" destroying the ecosystems there just because is probably not a good idea and to pull it off you'd probably need resources from elsewhere which would in turn cause more damage. Seems like not even a zero sum situation.