Scientists Want to Terraform The Sahara, The Pricetag: $2 Trillion Per Year - Polidicks

[QUOTE=Craptasket;17331308]sure, [img]http://weathersavvy.com/Deserts_Worldwide_HorseLati.gif[/img] trend of deserts along the tropic of cancer and capricorn Doesn't matter what you do the climate is now becuase of the sun and many factors Whatever you do it'd go back to being a desert, I bet all money on it no matter what humanly thing you do it's be a challange, you'd need to redirect the Nile and have a lot of human power to do it, that's my bet[/QUOTE] Nevermind, you're right.

do this or we are all dead

Haven't they learned their fucking lesson yet?

[QUOTE=Vasili;17330787]Or we could replace the areas we destroyed ourselves.[/QUOTE] This. [editline]11:25PM[/editline] [QUOTE=Craptasket;17331048]Geographically you'd be wasting your money trying, the hot climate will kill everything, you'd have to change something like our orbit to plant a forest on the Sahara. You would have to change our climate entirely but not on earth, axis and sun But you can go south of it [img_thumb]http://www.nationalgeographic.com/resources/ngo/maps/view/images/africam.jpg[/img_thumb] Here's my say, you redirect the Nile to w/e these idiots plant[/QUOTE] Yes the equator adds to the climate's heat, but that is not the cause. It was the same old equator when Sahara was a rainforest. What lead to it becoming a desert was, according to what I heard, humans.

[quote= wikipaedia]The climate of the Sahara has undergone enormous variation between wet and dry over the last few hundred thousand years. During the last glacial period, the Sahara was even bigger than it is today, extending south beyond its current boundaries. The end of the glacial period brought more rain to the Sahara, from about 8000 BC to 6000 BC, perhaps due to low pressure areas over the collapsing ice sheets to the north. Once the ice sheets were gone, northern Sahara dried out. But in southern Sahara, the drying trend was soon counteracted by the monsoon, which brought rain further north than it does today. The monsoon is due to heating of air over the land during summer. The hot air rises and pulls in cool, wet air from the ocean, which causes rain. Thus, though it seems counter-intuitive, the Sahara was wetter when it received more solar insolation in the summer. This was caused by a stronger tilt in Earth's axis of orbit than today, and perihelion occurred at the end of July. By around 3400 BC, the monsoon retreated south to approximately where it is today, leading to the gradual desertification of the Sahara. The Sahara is now as dry as it was about 13,000 years ago.These conditions are responsible for what has been called the Sahara pump theory. The Sahara has one of the harshest climates in the world. The prevailing north-easterly wind often causes the sand to form sand storms and dust devils. Half of the Sahara receives less than 2 centimetres (0.79 in) of rain per year, and the rest receives up to 10 cm (3.9 in) per year. The rainfall happens very rarely, but when it does it is usually torrential when it occurs after long dry periods, which can last for years. The southern boundary of the Sahara, as measured by rainfall, was observed to both advance and retreat between 1980 and 1990. As a result of drought in the Sahel, the southern boundary moved south 130 kilometres (81 mi) overall during that period.. Deforestation has also caused the Sahara to advance south in recent years, as trees and bushes continue to be used as fuel source. Recent signals indicate that the Sahara and surrounding regions are greening due to increased rainfall. Satellites show extensive regreening of the Sahel between 1982 and 2002, and in both Eastern and Western Sahara a more than 20 year long trend of increased grazing areas and flourishing trees and shrubs has been observed by climate scientist Stefan Kröpelin[/quote] Wikipedia's Idea over the desertification of the sahara

Or another idea is stop deforesting the already existing rain forests.

[QUOTE=BJK;17331577]This. [editline]11:25PM[/editline] Yes the equator adds to the climate's heat, but that is not the cause. [b]It was the same old equator when Sahara was a rainforest.[/b] What lead to it becoming a desert was, according to what I heard, humans.[/QUOTE] Proof please along with solar data and weather records please, also things grow at the equator, but the trend of deserts follow the tropic of cancer and Capricorn. and in all human record Sahara has been a desert in what size it was can be argued, if you want to change anything, Terraforming is not going to do it, you'd have to change the climate at a colossal scale in order to do what you want and im not talking about co2 levels, more than that

I don't know what's worse. Destroying the Amazon or the Locus Swarms. I don't know much about the Amazon other than it's a rainforest. But I know that the Locus Swarms are likely to cause a food shortage epidemic as they destroy tons of crops.

Maybe if we terraform the American deserts it will cause droughts in China. :science:

[QUOTE=Vasili;17330787]Or we could replace the areas we destroyed ourselves.[/QUOTE] So tear down cities, demolish power plants, and replant all the forests? Sounds like a good idea.

[QUOTE=Craptasket;17331048]Geographically you'd be wasting your money trying, the hot climate will kill everything, you'd have to change something like our orbit to plant a forest on the Sahara. You would have to change our climate entirely but not on earth, axis and sun But you can go south of it [img]http://www.nationalgeographic.com/resources/ngo/maps/view/images/africam.jpg[/img] Here's my say, you redirect the Nile to w/e these idiots plant[/QUOTE] Why are you posting Australia?

We should "practice" terraforming somewhere else so we will know what to do when we eventually begin to colonize mars

[QUOTE=Reflectent;17330185]What.[/QUOTE] I don't know how it will destroy the Amazon, but I know how it will unleash swarms of locusts. Locusts swarm into giant swarms of about 1 Billion each year during the rainy season. If a lush forest were to grow there then boom YEAR LONG RAINY SEASON. Possibly creating 5 billion strong swarms devouring everything in their path : Trees, Ferns, and all types of other greenery. I think this is a wonderful idea and will help the African's thrive under their locust overlords

[QUOTE=lazarus;17332733]Why are you posting Australia?[/QUOTE] Are you fucking serious?

[QUOTE=KarlHeinrichMarx;17330202]Why? Just fill the fucking place up with solar panels and provide the whole world electricity.[/QUOTE] This would be a great idea; except people may come along and beat them to shit for some reason. It would cost alot, especially all the wiring to be done to reach major cities;

guys, do you know how many nukes we could make with 2 trillion dollars

What's next? Bomb the amazon?

[QUOTE=Fentoozler;17333774]guys, do you know how many nukes we could make with 2 trillion dollars[/QUOTE] 4

2 trillion $ isn't ACTUALLY that much compared to the expenses of some other things...

Is this short scale trillion or long scale? ( For those who don't know, Trillion in short scale is 1,000,000,000,000 { 10^12 } while in long scale it is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 { 10 ^ 18 } )

[QUOTE=Sasupoika;17334199]Is this short scale trillion or long scale? ( For those who don't know, Trillion in short scale is 1,000,000,000,000 { 10^12 } while in long scale it is 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 { 10 ^ 18 } )[/QUOTE] Short scale. Equivalent in long scale would be billion

[QUOTE=Uberman77883;17330179]If making the Sahara into a lush forest would destroy sea life, an entire jungle, and annihilate whatever crops the Africans? The Sahara is natural, and should stay there for good reason. I pity those who say it's a good idea. I want to hear you say that when the already tattered economy is further stressed, and more of the ecosystem is destroyed than replenished.[/QUOTE] 5000 years ago it was full of forests, get the fuck out.

[QUOTE=Xmeagol;17337732]5000 years ago it was full of forests, get the fuck out.[/QUOTE] Do you have evidence to support that claim?

[QUOTE=RichardNixon;17330425]It would go into the atmosphere, where we would have to collect it and physically turn it back into water, extremely pure water.[/QUOTE] Who needs water when we have oil? :smug:

[QUOTE=SuPeR_MaN;17337831]Who needs water when we have oil? :smug:[/QUOTE] Who needs oil when we have water? :smug:

Holy shit dicks. What are they doing? This is about the biggest project ever.

While this is a crazy idea, it would be awesome to be able to go "Son, I remember when the Sahara Jungle was nothing but desert..."

Well, terraforming the Sahara probably isn't really the best solution, as it would starve the South Atlantic and the Amazon Rainforest of the valuable minerals in it's precious sands. But there's another place that could be terraformed to suit our needs. The Australian Outback is a comparatively harsh and arid environ, with relatively lifeless deserts and underproductive grasslands. If we find some way to irrigate the heartlands by excavating vast channels of water to permeate the heart of the continent, then the outback could flourish into green (using tropical breeds of eucalyptus, of course), serving to generate a massive carbon sink similar in size to the rainforests in Central Africa, or at least as big as the Democratic Republic of Congo. Moving massive quantities of earth to create these channels would require high costs, though probably not as much as would be required to irrigate the Sahara, although the mass planting of trees, and the introduction of earthworms to process the soils, would also be important costs. With forests flourishing there, the monsoon rains could once again reach into the previously-arid outback, not being dissipated by the radiant heats of the desert. The presence of the outback forests could also serve to be a boon to koalas, although it might cause a few problems for kangaroos, with the forests being hard to navigate. But at least it'd be a lot cooler for the poor blighters. All in all, we should terraform the Australian Outback instead. It isn't as if the outback's sands are blown about the world... Are they?

Let's just get rid of Africa and put solar panels and wind turbines there instead. Two birds one stone.

Ha only just 2 trillion? that's like enough to end poverty in Africa