Richard Fox (rcfox@igc.apc.org) President of Global Resource
Consultants recently ADVERTISED a "remarkable technological
breakthrough" called "The Eden Device" on this list. According to
Richard this device will enable you to "grow trees in the desert".
This scenario reminds me of a novel called DUNE by Frank Herbert.
Although I enjoyed the book very much (and the movie somewhat) I
questioned the ecological logic of what the natives of DUNE (the
fremen, I think) were trying to accomplish. They were collecting all
of the water they could from the planets surface and storing it in
underground cisterns. Their plan was to someday, when they had
collected enough water, return this water to the surface to transform
DUNE from a desert planet to an Eden. During the time period of the
book, the planet's surface was so dry that the fremen had to wear
special suits to reclaim all moisture (such as from their breath,
sweat and excrement).
What has this to do with a device that allows you to grow trees in the
desert? If you capture water from the dry desert air you will create
even drier conditions downwind. Native plants and animals will
suffer, if not be eliminated. This could result in such trivial
things as, oh, say, a dust bowl. If the fremen return all of the
water they removed from the planet surface they will have about what
they started with (at best).
I cannot understand why so very many people want to go to the desert
and try to make it into a lush, green Eden Supposedly a lot of people
move to the desert to take advantage of the wide open spaces and clean,
dry air. If you visit the wide open spaces with clean air you will
probably not see very many people. That is because 99% of them live in
big cities like Phoenix or Salt Lake City which have anything but clean
air (have you seen the yellow brown muck that hangs over Salt Lake City
lately). I would think that the pollutants would outweigh the dry
aspect of the air. If you don't want to be in a desert then go
somewhere else to live or grow trees. The desert is a wonderful place,
but it can only sustain a limited amount of use.
One possibly appropriate application of such an "Eden device" would be
in areas being subjected to desertification, and then only to
reestablish native vegetation and not to support tree plantations.
Someday humans will have to admit that they cannot control the weather,
hydrologic cycles, etc. Unfortunately it will take a major catastrophe
in a (or several) well developed country(ies) to get that point across.
When are we going to wise up????
Just my $0.02 worth. I will now get off my soap box and brace myself
for the barrage of . . (replies).
Bob Keeland, Forest Ecologist
keelandb@osprey.nwrc.gov
The opinions expressed are my own and do not reflect the views of my
employer.
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