US$2trillion a year to TERRAFORM the Sahara. Should we do it?

Some experts say that it *could* cost up to US$2 trillion a year to "terraform" (green) the Sahara, a vast region within mainland Africa which is about the size of the United States.

...The Sahara desert is 8.6 million km² (3.32 million mi²) in size. It’s roughly the size of America — if you filled America with sand and took away all of the trees...

...Terraforming an area this massive wouldn’t be easy, in fact, it would cost about $2 trillion a year, and unfortunately, the price tag would be just the beginning of our obstacles. What kind of environmental domino effect would this create...

What if we terraformed the Sahara desert?

I'm also just trying to think about what space exploration would look like if US$2 trillion a year was spent on deep space exploration efforts haha

You forgot the link to your article... I gave you a star and a flag just for the originality of terraforming the Sahara..

My response to such a program is the cost does not do much for the program but place it out of reach for everyone except a true world effort..

Next thing IMO the Sahara is a desert for a reason... it used to be lush and green... and it is not nice to mess with mother nature.... hahahah.... make it lush and green and maybe a bigger desert shows up at the most inconvenient place ? Besides AOC and others seem to think the world was gonna end in 12 years.. !! So why bother (sarc).. ?

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

This is clearly a 'What would it take?' vs. 'Should it ever be done'. If you asked me what is would cost to stop the wind in Chicago, I could put a price on it with enough costly superbaffles, smart fans etc., however this subject is purely a pseudo-effort of absurd proportions to put dollars on dirt/plant/water solutions that would run for eternity without thought to where you get the resources.

That said, these exercises do have some validity to space exploration where you have to transport and maintain missing/deficient resources.

How much would it cost to build a permanently snowed full-scale Mt Hood in Dalls TX. ? There is a real man/dollar/year amount that could be estimated, lol.

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

You ever hear of the Great-Man Made River Project? Yep, thats the one that Obama had attacked blew up after the USA first attacked Egypt and then killed Muammar al-Gaddafi. Gadaffi started it. I always thought all along that's why the USA went on the offensive in the middle east after Iraq.

The Great Man-Made River (GMR, النهر الصناعي العظيم) is a network of pipes that supplies water to the Sahara in Libya, from the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System fossil aquifer. It is the world's largest irrigation project.[1] According to its website, it is the largest underground network of pipes (2,820 kilometres (1,750 mi))[2] and aqueducts in the world. It consists of more than 1,300 wells, most more than 500 m deep, and supplies 6,500,000 m3 of fresh water per day to the cities of Tripoli, Benghazi, Sirte and elsewhere. The late Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi described it as the "Eighth Wonder of the World".[3]

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

You ever hear of the Great-Man Made River Project? Yep, thats the one that Obama had attacked blew up after the USA first attacked Egypt and then killed Muammar al-Gaddafi. Gadaffi started it. I always thought all along that's why the USA went on the offensive in the middle east after Iraq.

The Great Man-Made River (GMR, النهر الصناعي العظيم) is a network of pipes that supplies water to the Sahara in Libya, from the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System fossil aquifer. It is the world's largest irrigation project.[1] According to its website, it is the largest underground network of pipes (2,820 kilometres (1,750 mi))[2] and aqueducts in the world. It consists of more than 1,300 wells, most more than 500 m deep, and supplies 6,500,000 m3 of fresh water per day to the cities of Tripoli, Benghazi, Sirte and elsewhere. The late Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi described it as the "Eighth Wonder of the World".[3]

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

Well the reason for the desert existing is quite unnatural, so it would be a nice thing to resurrect the ancient river systems that once flowed there, thus making the region grow again.

originally posted by: Waterglass
a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

You ever hear of the Great-Man Made River Project? Yep, thats the one that Obama had attacked blew up after the USA first attacked Egypt and then killed Muammar al-Gaddafi. Gadaffi started it. I always thought all along that's why the USA went on the offensive in the middle east after Iraq.

The Great Man-Made River (GMR, النهر الصناعي العظيم) is a network of pipes that supplies water to the Sahara in Libya, from the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System fossil aquifer. It is the world's largest irrigation project.[1] According to its website, it is the largest underground network of pipes (2,820 kilometres (1,750 mi))[2] and aqueducts in the world. It consists of more than 1,300 wells, most more than 500 m deep, and supplies 6,500,000 m3 of fresh water per day to the cities of Tripoli, Benghazi, Sirte and elsewhere. The late Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi described it as the "Eighth Wonder of the World".[3]

It does make you wonder what would have happened to this project if Gaddafi had not been killed and Libya thrown into chaos and instability...

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

Nahhh don't do it.
Mother nature will do it for free next imminent poleshift.

Probably fake news to funnel of more money to the elites.

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

We could build a space elevator and colonize low Earth orbit for 2 Trillion $$$$.

Not that the idea does not have merit.

But, it's out of the dirt and into the sky we wish to be headed, not the other way around.

a reply to: andy06shake

We can't build a space elevator because we do not have strong enough materials to build one. We could on Mars because of less gravity.

There are other things that we could do like build a Lofstrom Loop.

a reply to: Grimpachi

Nope, the material science and required tolerances is pretty much there with carbon nano thread, diamond nano thread to be specific.

What we don't have are production facilities and techniques to produce the stuff in mass quantities.

Plenty of things we could do, nevermind should do.

a reply to: andy06shake

So like I said we do not have the materials except in theory. We don't even have the knowledge to make them in the lengths needed. Which means we don't have them.

On top of that, there has been a study on carbon nano thread and the conclusion has been it is not strong enough. As far as diamond nano thread I have not heard of that, but I doubt we have the knowledge to manufacture that either.

As far as theoretical materials go for building a space elevatore Graphine seems to be the best bet, but like the others, we do not have a way to manufacture it to the specs that would be needed.

If we want to build a structure now that could aid us in going to space the current technologies available would permit a Lofstrom Loop, but no amount of money could build us a space elevator. Maybe in a few years that will change, but currently we are limited.

a reply to: TheRepublicOfCanada

I would not be opposed to some of my tax dollars going toward such a project.

a reply to: Grimpachi

No, we can make the stuff, just not in the quantities required to fashion a tether as of yet.

Diamond nano thread will do the job.

Recently a new type of ultrathin one-dimensional carbon nanostructure(diamond nano threads DNT) had been synthesized.

This is achieved through the solid-state reaction of benzene under high pressure.

A few years to come up with the mass scale production techniques and facilities i suppose, but the material science to do so is already within our grasp.

Egypt and the like are water poor, major cities struggle to cope as it is, terraforming deserts because, reasons, doesn't make much sense.
Maybe do Nevada and move homeless people there?

a reply to: andy06shake

I'd just like to deliver you guys this one.
It seems a space elevator is indeed doable.
Its from a month ago..

www.technologyreview.com...

www.nbcnews.com...

Thanks.

a reply to: Nivek555

Aye but the motivation nevermind the monies remain to be seen in any kind of significant commitment.

Cheers for the links all the same.

The fact is we are far more interested in imaginary lines on maps than we are an actual line into space.

a reply to: andy06shake

I looked up Diamond nano thread and this is where it all falls apart. It is very strong and very stiff. Even if we could make 6 or more kilometer sections which we cant. On record, they were able to make a piece 90 nanometers in length .5 meters and while it is flexible it isn't flexible enough to fold back on itself. They can make it more flexible, but to do so they have to manufacture defects into it. The more defects a strand has the more flexible it will be. Which also compromises its strength.

So even though we can make it we do not have a way to make it in lengths that would be needed and even if we could make it in those legths it would have to be made on the spot to feed it from space to the earth to avoid having too many defects.

We do not have the ability to do either.

a reply to: Grimpachi

Put it this way we live in very interesting times.

It's not the science nor technologies that are holding us back.

It's the 1%ers and bankers.

Where there is a will, there is a way, and the tech is there, it simply needs to be refined.

We do not have the ability to return to the Moon, and yet we did in the late 60s and early 70s.

We can make the stuff, and if we choose to do so, we can make it do the job at hand.

originally posted by: contextual
Egypt and the like are water poor, major cities struggle to cope as it is, terraforming deserts because, reasons, doesn't make much sense.
Maybe do Nevada and move homeless people there?

Part of the transforming efforts would require you use energy to desalinize water and flood the area. If you can do that with clean abundant energy, it wouldn't be too much of a problem.

The benefit would be after some years of success, the area would yield more fresh water because rain would be able to exist in the region without evaporating or running off quickly. One could even say the transpiration of vibrant vegetation might yield more rain for the region.

Then again, this is all theory... But once it meets a point of being economical, I'd love to give it a try some where.