Engineering the consequences of climate change Topic 1 - The Salt Lakes & Seas

[MyUncle]

FYI, I'd like to post in this forum some ideas regarding fixing climate change consequences. I want to talk about how to mitigate the effects on planetary temperature change.

I do not believe we can reverse the current CO2 emissions increases from fossil fuels for many decades. The primary reason is that 3rd and 2nd world communities want fuel based economies. A fuel based economy greatly enhances their life expectancy and their perceived quality of life at the least expense. To deny them that is going to prove extremely problematic and highly unlikely. You may or may not disagree, just wanted to tell you where I'm coming from.

I want to discuss, desalination, CO2 recapture and disposition, space based solutions, etc.

I hope it's stimulating.

My first idea is the replenishment of the Salt Seas and lakes around the world. I read that the Dead Sea level is dramatically dropping Dead Sea water loss continues at record rate. The Dead Sea dropped a record 4.9 feet over the last 12 months because of industry use and evaporation, the Hydrological Service of Israel said. - http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2019541368_deadsea28.html

Would it be possible to mitigate some of the lowering salt sea & lake levels by pumping sea water from rising oceans in to these salt bodies of water? I live near the Salton Sea, a dying lake, that once was a recreational mecca as well as an important bird sanctuary. This lake will die unless something is done. Why not set up global programs to pump water from the ocean and fill these lakes so they return to something that is not dead or dying?

The infrastructure projects are huge (jobs) - for example getting a salt water pipeline the Great Salt Lake. The threats from a spill are minimal using oil maintenance and monitoring technology. Below is a table that lists how much water in each place and what % that represents. I do not believe glaciers will completely melt so we are taking about fractional but perhaps significantly lowering sea levels so it is safer.

Oceans 1,370,000 97.61%
Glaciers, ice, snow 29,000 2.08%
Subsurface 4,067 0 .295%
Freshwat lakes, rivers 126 0.009%
Saline lakes 104 0.008%
Atmosphere 14 0.001%

Here is another link to a list of the salt lakes in the world

http://lakes.chebucto.org/saline1.html

[mike_c]

1. the energy costs would be enormous, while the benefits would be minimal...

...except perhaps in terms of maintaining the shrinking habitats that are disappearing, i.e. Salt Lake, Salton Sea, etc. But aside from the simple energy costs of pumping that much water over mountain ranges and such, the water itself would have to be extensively filtered and treated to avoid contamination with invasive marine species. And the effects on rising oceans would likely be so small as to be essentially undetectable.

[MyUncle]

2. Hydrolic engineering and planning make for minimal energy use.

The Romans did it with their aqueduct system, California did it in the early 1900's with minimal technology. I agree that there would need to be filtration possible sterilization to prevent invasive species. But invaded species are better than no species?

In future posts there will be additional incremental ideas. I believe there are going to be many small solutions that will need to add up, just like wind, solar, tide energy etc.

[mike_c]

7. California's plumbing is a somewhat different matter...

...as it has gravity mostly on it's side, i.e. the water drains from the Sierra snow pack, largely, to the central valley, with only a few relatively short lifts except at Edmonston. Likewise the Roman aqueducts, which mostly flow downhill. The Edmonston pumps lift CA aqueduct water 600 m over the Tehatchipi Mtns at significant energy expense. From Wikipedia: "The Edmonston Pumping station requires so much power that several power lines off of Path 15 and Path 26 are needed to ensure proper operation of the pumps." Getting from sea level to the Salton Sea might not be much more difficult from the Gulf, but getting sea water to Salt Lake would entail much higher lifts.

Some of that energy cost can be generated by hydroelectric power during the downhill portions, but that would require vast impoundments-- of sea water, mind you-- and correspondingly massive amounts of habitat destruction. Plus, most of the available routes are already significant freshwater corridors, introducing further opportunities for ecosystem damage.

And for all this energy cost and potential ecosystem damage, the actual benefits with regard to sea level rise would be nearly immeasurably slight.

[MyUncle]

14. Well stated, Salt Lake, tough one. Salton and Dead Sea, not so much.

My basic premise is engineering mitigation. When sea levels rise, we can try and make them lower. Some other ideas would be a massive conversion to desalinated water, a geo synced space based shade over the north polar ice cap, all will have incremental effects on undesired outcomes. That's the dream anyway. Don't want to tip to many future topics.

[modrepub]

3. Efficiency Standards

We should be adopting efficiency standards for electrical generation and other large energy users similar to what we've done for the automobile industry. Unfortunately it's very difficult at this time to mitigate the effects of CO2. That may change in the future but adaptation is probably the best strategy we can pursue. Not building along the coasts would probably be another good idea but I don't think we are "ready" to be told that beachfront property can't be developed.

[MyUncle]

4. Those are future topics - landscape/hardscape solutions.

I literally think about this stuff to try and quiet my mind when I can't sleep. Hint, I'm going to be stealing and making earth friendly some of Kim Stanley Robinson's books and other influences.

[AverageJoe90]

8. Adaptation is a noble strategy, but like less consumption, that alone won't solve the problem.

Luckily enough, there are other things that can be done as well:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-too-hard-advanced.htm

Probably the best article I've ever seen on this subject, really.

[jenw2]

5. How much CO2 would those pumps create?

Strict limits and increased prices are the only solutions that will reduce consumption.

[MyUncle]

6. CO2 mitigation is another challenge for a future topic, I do not disagree.

I'm talking about rising seas mitigation.

[Speck Tater]

9. I seem to recall hearing that the lowest point between the ocean and the Salton sea is 38 feet,

or something in that neighborhood. If the sea level goes up by 38 feet the Salton Sea will become an extension of the Gulf of California just like it was before delta sediment laid down the natural levee tens of thousands of years ago cutting off the Salton Sea from the ocean. Mexicali, El Centro and Brawley are all built on top of that natural levee.

To save the Salton Sea we can either dig a canal from there to the Gulf of California, or just wait 50 years for the gulf to come to the Salton Sea.

[MyUncle]

10. Good point and it reminded me that I forgot something.

Again these are massive engineering centric solutions to mitigate consequences of rising oceans. The Salton Sea is very shallow and I'm not sure about topography, but having driven that route and flown over many times, I think you right on that as well.

The lakes in many instances would need to be made deeper with berms from the dredgng to increase the volume of water that we can displace from the oceans. The idea is to not have the Gulf of California meet the Salton Sea.

[NoOneMan]

11. A fuel based economy greatly enhances their .... quality of life at the least expense.

I hope you are figuring in all the energy we spend on opiates that convince us to ignore how fuckn miserable we are in our wonderful oil-run world.

[MyUncle]

13. I said "perceived" big difference.

[OSPREYXIV]

12. Thank you. Please develop your idea.

According to your OP, recreating inland seas
would (presumably) restore only a fraction of the re-uptake capacity needed to stabilize or reverse the ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere. (In a similar manner, proposals were put forth over 20 years ago to re-engineer existing pipelines in coastal Louisiana to deliver silt-laden river water from the Atchafalaya basin river to accelerate renewal of the wetlands. These big ideas need momentum.

Does highly saline water capture CO2 much more readily? Can hypersaline re-seas become solar- electric generating facilitiies a la the ones built in the Negev desert using parabolic reflectors that focus solar energy on tubes of molten salt that act as a transfer medium?
What modern era data supports is much more dismaying and also suggests is an easier, quicker answer may be at hand. (Not sandbagging or laying a false trail here, just asking: what's highest and best rate of return on investment. We need to move fast. The quicker we achieve critical mass opinion, the quicker the politicians get off their well-upholstered chair bottoms.

Deforestation accelerated during the Industrial Revolution but no one seems to knowvwhat this has done to alter global rain cycles. If they do, they're keeping it to themselves. History tells us whenever land empires were established, they resultes in denuded treeless landscaoes with very eroded topsoil. Empires existed for one reason: kill the neighbors and take their land. In India, Persia, Macedonia, Rome, Arabia, China, Mongolia or outsiders, gangs on camels and horses instread of motorcycles or Mercedes, i.e., Seljuk Turks, Ottomans, Huns, Ostrogoths, etc. Nomads were v adept at this, thus great empires rose and fell overnight. Spain's collapse was not due to a hyper-inflationary gold-based monetary system but because Phillip II cut down every tree in Spain for an armada of green timber that was demolished when a freak storms hit the Irish Sea in mid-expedition. Olaaa! Adios, Phillipe.

Trees make it rain. The Amazon Basin causes its own rainfall due to plant respiration-caused air currents rising and falling as daily rain in the wet season. (The trans-Pacific westerlies dump their moisture on the eastern Andean slopes.) The AB is an infinitely larger (unenclosed) version of the Caspian, Aral, Salton and Dead Seas, shallow primordial basins left behind when the coastlines rose up and the shore receded at the end of the last Ice Age.

Put simply, we are reducing complex natural systems to (momentarily) profitable mono- cultures as fast as we can and we need to stop and throw it in reverse to avoid going over the edge. Seems like Wiley Coyote, Esquire is driving this bus. Meep-meep? What a strange place.

If trees make it rain, make it rain trees. Schemes abound (Chuck Jones, we miss you) to airdrop biodegradable plastic cylinders containing tree seedlings, nutrients, etc. like sonobuoys from Lockheed P-3's repainted in US Forest Service livery. Others propose using multi-layered pellets of charcoal and nutrients coated in BD polymers that contain genetically altered, pre-selected seed material. Schemes aplenty are out there in the idea-o-sphere, languishing only for want of... seed money. (Couldn't stop him. Sorry.)

What's missing isn't powerful people with money, it's the mindpower of the world's people. We're up to our waistlines in ppwerful rich people. See us making any headway? Anyone? Bueller?

We don't have enemies. We have unrecognized opportunities and indifferent, corrupt leadership in the Congress. Together we are Giants. Me, I'm sick and tired of being treated like less than zero by people who couldn't make it in Hollywood so they get their kicks in politics.

No more taxation without representation.
We demand a system that's fair and square, a government of, by and for the people of the United States of America, not just corporate, stooges, lackeys, lobbyists, lawyers and liars.
We will not settle for mere victory if the Constitution is being held hostage to greed, prejudice and ignorance. In God We Trust.

[drm604]

15. You'd need to be careful of salinity levels.

How much of the drop in salt lake levels is due to evaporation? Evaporation removes only water, not salt, so replacing evaporated water with sea water would increase the salinity.

[MyUncle]

16. Actually it would decrease the salinity of the lakes/seas.

They are wildly salty to the point that buoyancy is amazing. By adding sea water that has a lower saline content, we'll be making the salt seas and lakes healthier.

I will grant you that they will have higher salinity than a long time ago.

[drm604]

17. That was my point.

They will be saltier than they originally were. And if you keep adding sea water over time to maintain depth, you'll be making it saltier and saltier.

It would be better to add fresh water, perhaps desalinated sea water.

[Speck Tater]

18. How about solar-powered freezers at the poles to keep the ice frozen? nt

[MyUncle]

19. I've got that one coming up with a bit of a twist. Stay tuned.