A Random Dumb Idea

[Techno-Druid]

So I was messing with Google Earth, looking at Libya (do I need to give an explanation?) when I noticed that there were a boat load of indents in the desert near the shorelines extending pretty far inland and branch off. Many look liked they could have once been deltas and estuaries that extended into a long web of rivers.

Granted I'm no engineer, but I started bullshitting with an idea then. What if you could engineer a large structure that somehow takes in sea water through said structure and desalinates the seawater and creates artificial rivers and pools that can support native flora, fauna and Libyans.

Any clue is something like this could work? Does someone mind possibly reworking this idea to be more plausible?

[Deleted]

Too busy being shit poor Islamists.

[Belize]

Desalination is still relatively expensive, and Libya is a poor as shit country.

Plus, local warlords would probably take over all of the resources.

[Techno-Druid]

Too busy being shit poor Islamists.

Yeah, although if something like this could be built, it may decrease Islamic terrorism as it could provide econonic stability.

[Afrospinach]

Any clue is something like this could work? Does someone mind possibly reworking this idea to be more plausible?

http://www.seawatergreenhouse.com/

This is most likely the closest you will get to anything workable.

[Deleted]

And who will pay for it?

[Ripster42]

And who will pay for it?

They just need to cut taxes and they'll have all the money they need to pay for it.

BTW, sure, desalination is expensive... but building artificial lakes and rivers using desalinated water is just lunacy. Desalination is expensive in amounts used for drinking water, I can't even imagine the expense of enough for artificial lakes and rivers, let alone the energy to pump water upstream to create those rivers. BTW, artificial lakes/canals themselves aren't cheap to build.

[Kalis]

What would be the point? The issue with Libya is not that they do not have enough plants or animals, it is that they are leaderless.

[Deleted]

Wonder what the climatic impact on europe would be.

[Deleted]

And who will pay for it?

With a small loan...

[Grummgug]

You aren't factoring in corruption.

We've had experience giving food or money to impoverished nations. We've learned that if you do this for a corrupt nation, then the corrupt leaders hoard your gifts and ration them out to the people in exchange for them recognizing the leader as a thug warlord. And they will be brutal in protecting their control.

If you just built a massive desalination program in Libya for free, and handed it over to whomever, it might fall into the hands of a corrupt leader. That leader would immediately withhold all the water and demand the public recognize him as warlord or god-king or something, and eternally manufacture shortages to ensure the people are obedient. They would also repackage and sell the free water and ridiculously high prices (probably destroying competing water sources to help drive up prices) to make themselves rich.

The final situation would be you built a public works system to help the people and it only helped create a brutal dictatorship led by a savage warlord. You'd have to be very careful that an intelligent, kind, and just society gets established first that can responsibly handle this tech.

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In short, you cant do this because people are assholes.

In western society, we tie the hands of government as much as possible because we know if government gets too big and powerful, then its only a matter of time before some asshole takes power and corrupts it all for personal gain.

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Another problem is that there are otherwise brilliant scientists and engineers and thinkers who come up with great ways to build infrastructure like this but they have no social skills and don't understand how just giving their tech away can create brutal warlords. So your question is a common one and some of them go as far as thinking that you have to be an evil person to not want to just give technology, food, and money away to poor regions.

[Afrospinach]

They just need to cut taxes and they'll have all the money they need to pay for it.

BTW, sure, desalination is expensive... but building artificial lakes and rivers using desalinated water is just lunacy. Desalination is expensive in amounts used for drinking water, I can't even imagine the expense of enough for artificial lakes and rivers, let alone the energy to pump water upstream to create those rivers. BTW, artificial lakes/canals themselves aren't cheap to build.

Yes, traditional farming takes and enormous amount of water that is really not practical for desalination. Though, they do evap seawater in ponds in Aussie and Isreal for sea salt. If they can capture that water there may be some hope to the idea.

I think that company I listed has undergone some kind of restructuring or merger or something. Their site used to be a lot more coherent, but they do not desalinate their water, it is dribbled though a wet wall where it is blown by fans. In addition to getting fresh water it reduces the transpirational stress on the plants because of the rise in humidity. It produces fresh water and cooling without any expensive desalination process. You would have to cool for most crops in those regions anyway so it is a marginal cost increase. They supposedly produce excess water.

In the real long term you might be able to change the climate though, deserts are deserts for a reason. You may be eternally fighting nature.

What would be the point? The issue with Libya is not that they do not have enough plants or animals, it is that they are leaderless.

If you look at OP's post history I think this unlikely to be political are more about land utilisation. Libya is a somewhat arid region next to the sea, they can do stuff if they really want. There are not too many locations like it, saudi peninsular, namibia, western sahara(which interestingly enough has rather large phosphate reserves).

[Deleted]

You aren't factoring in corruption.

We've had experience giving food or money to impoverished nations. We've learned that if you do this for a corrupt nation, then the corrupt leaders hoard your gifts and ration them out to the people in exchange for them recognizing the leader as a thug warlord. And they will be brutal in protecting their control.

If you just built a massive desalination program in Libya for free, and handed it over to whomever, it might fall into the hands of a corrupt leader. That leader would immediately withhold all the water and demand the public recognize him as warlord or god-king or something, and eternally manufacture shortages to ensure the people are obedient. They would also repackage and sell the free water and ridiculously high prices (probably destroying competing water sources to help drive up prices) to make themselves rich.

The final situation would be you built a public works system to help the people and it only helped create a brutal dictatorship led by a savage warlord. You'd have to be very careful that an intelligent, kind, and just society gets established first that can responsibly handle this tech.

- - - Updated - - -

In short, you cant do this because people are assholes.

In western society, we tie the hands of government as much as possible because we know if government gets too big and powerful, then its only a matter of time before some asshole takes power and corrupts it all for personal gain.

- - - Updated - - -

Another problem is that there are otherwise brilliant scientists and engineers and thinkers who come up with great ways to build infrastructure like this but they have no social skills and don't understand how just giving their tech away can create brutal warlords. So your question is a common one and some of them go as far as thinking that you have to be an evil person to not want to just give technology, food, and money away to poor regions.

Well you got the corruption part right, you just got the rest wrong.

The corruption comes from the local elites who siphon off all the investment and hide it offshore. For instance in Iraq we spent 7billion USD to build a sewage system in Baghdad. But it didn't get build/it was built incredibly badly. That 7 billion got siphoned off by the elite and shipped into propety in Dubai thanks to the likes of mossack fonseca and companies like that. These societies are full on kleptocracies.

If money was given for a huge project like this it would be stolen, concealed in an offshore haven and then legally laundered.

[Kalis]

If money was given for a huge project like this it would be stolen, concealed in an offshore haven and then legally laundered.

That is just redistribution of wealth, something your lot usually are all for.

At least when they are not too busy hating on Jews.

[Deleted]

That is just redistribution of wealth, something your lot usually are all for.

At least when they are not too busy hating on Jews.

Redistributed to the elite, great. Tory mantra, they do it much smarter in this country tho, ie Royal Mail.
Also not a labour voter try again.

[Theodarzna]

The idea of greening the Sahara Desert is an idea floated before, but that level of geo-engineering remains beyond us at the moment. Climatically the Sahara would fight us every step of the way.

We COULD destroy panama and open the Pacific and Atlantic seaway. Roughly at that time the Sahara was wetter and grassy with many water ways. Europe however idk how it would fair. Europe would become significantly warmer further north, meaning for example the British Isles, Iceland and the Atlantic coast of Europe would be over all warmer most likely. Many credit the formation of Panama with creating the Arctic climate and cooling Europe as well as the waves of Ice Ages that made Europe and North America's landscape so odd/interesting.

[Kalis]

Redistributed to the elite, great. Tory mantra, they do it much smarter in this country tho, ie Royal Mail.
Also not a labour voter try again.

So not Labour...hmm.

Certainly not Conservative, nobody would ever admit to being a Lib Dem, presumably not UKIP or BNP as you hate the Tories for being too right wing, not a sweaty so SNP are out, supports Crystal Palace and not Cardiff eliminating Plaid Cymru, not Irish thus I can scratch off the crazy patchwork of mentalist parties over there, Greens are for the gays.

So either George Galloway or Tooting Popular Front.

[Yunru]

It would probaly be cheaper just to pump seawater into sahara. And then use plants that work well with them.
Mangrove for example.
http://www.amnh.org/explore/science-...-does-it-work/