Please log in.
Before you can vote, you need to register. Please log in or create an account.
Science: Terraforming: Water
Better Weather Canals   (+7, -2)  [vote for, against]
Fill Low Areas in Deserts with Sea Water

Dig canals from the sea into deserts, many of which have areas below sea lavel, to add water and humidity to the area thereby encouraging better, wetter weather in arid regions.
-- LeBain, Jan 16 2002

(?) Dead sea receding rapidly http://www.accessat...31e123d0f210c1.html
One candidate project [LeBain, Jan 16 2002, last modified Oct 21 2004]

(?) Death Valley, US, CA http://www.american...alley/badwater.html
Another candidate [LeBain, Jan 16 2002, last modified Oct 21 2004]

Poorly named topic http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/River
Overly complicated version [LeBain, Jan 16 2002, last modified Oct 17 2004]

How to dig it http://www.halfbake.../idea/Navirrigation
But is the Outback below sea level? [LeBain, Jan 16 2002, last modified Oct 17 2004]

Salton Sea http://www.sci.sdsu...nBasinHomePage.html
[rapid transit, Oct 17 2004, last modified Oct 21 2004]

I'll vote for it, despite the adverse effects such a project might have on hantavirus-harboring rodents, venomous lizards and snakes, stinging and biting arachnids, and flora which impales. Or maybe because of it.
-- Guncrazy, Jan 16 2002


I've ordered my Shark Proof Surfboard
Factoid: saltwater freezes at lower temps than freshwater.
-- thumbwax, Jan 16 2002


And simutaneously creating an arid inhospitable salt pan every time there was a high tide flood...
-- goff, Jan 16 2002


Say, Rods Tiger, how are folks in the UK handling those reports about how the Gulf Stream can switch 'off' as a result of global warming, and plunge your lands into Siberian weather within a couple years or so, and for thousands of years thereafter?
-- entremanure, Jan 19 2002


Wouldn't the water just evaporate, or sink into the dry sand? Ah, I guess that's part of why the similar, previous idea was rejected...
-- snarfyguy, Jan 19 2002


I have yet to hear 2 so called experts on global warming agree about anything. Like all weather reports if they say it will be dry, take your umbrella. famous last words," no hurricane tonight folks!"
-- po, Jan 19 2002


All I'll say about global warming is: Thank god that the cave men living during the last ice age had the foresight and necessary technology to warm the globe.
-- Guncrazy, Jan 19 2002


Surely this would gradually happen anyway with population pressure don`t you think? I seem to remember reading somewhere that the black sea was a flooded bit of lowland..or was it the Med?
-- andrewuk, Jan 19 2002


Baked. Salton Sea in California. See link.

[goff] A salt pan would come about eventually, regardless of proximity to the ocean. All naturally obtained water has salt in it. In a region of high evaporation like a desert, the water evaporates, leaving the salt behind. Eventually it all accumulates and you either have an area of land useless for farming, or a body of water saltier than the ocean.
-- rapid transit, May 16 2003



random, halfbakery