Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumIndonesian President Wants Giant Seawall Around Jakarta - Which Is Already Sinking 8" Per Year
When all else fails, build another giant stone head.
Late last week, president Joko Widodo of Indonesia told the AP that hes fast-tracking a decade-in-the-making plan for a giant seawall around Jakarta, a city thats sinking as much as 8 inches a year in placesand as seas rise, no less. Models predict that by 2050, a third of the city could be submerged. Its an urban existential crisis the likes of which the modern world has never seen.
But deploying a seawall is a massive political and engineering problem in any country, to say nothing of Indonesias struggles with a literal underlying crisis: Jakartas people are pumping too much groundwater, and consequently the land is collapsing underneath them. If Jakarta cant find a way to hydrate its people some other way, itll keep sinking, pulling that new seawall down with it. Its a glimpse of a dark future for much of human civilization, which stubbornly clings to coasts around the world.
Think of Jakarta as sitting on top of giant water bottles, aka aquifers. Forty percent of its 10 million residents get their water from pumping, so theyve been draining those bottles, which consequently collapse, leading to land subsidence. This, by the way, is not unique to Jakarta: Californias Central Valley has sunk by as much as 30 feet for the same reason. But because other nations have dealt with the problem, Jakarta knows how to fix it.
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The city has 13 rivers, for instance, but theyre all polluted. Desalination might help provide the city with fresh water, but its enormously expensive to run such plants. And Jakarta doesnt do water recycling, so it could actually learn a thing or two from Singapore or even Los Angeles, of all places. Of course if we don't stop the subsidence, the seawall will go down too, says Andreas.
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https://www.wired.com/story/jakarta-giant-sea-wall/
htuttle
(23,738 posts)CanonRay
(14,104 posts)yeah, that makes sense.
bronxiteforever
(9,287 posts)Jakarta was built on a swamp. It is a city both sinking and running out of water. That does not sound like it ends well. I read a great history of the colonial city in Simon Winchester book on Krakatoa.
a 2010 government-commissioned study found that 474 new cars and 2,946 motorbikes joined Jakartas chaotic traffic each day - bringing the total to about 14.4 million cars and motorbikes on the streets of Jakarta and its satellite cities. A staggering statistic, given the capitals population estimated at just over 10 million residents.
https://abcnews.go.com/International/time-running-jakarta-sinking-capital-indonesia-amid-calls/story?id=62726706