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The visionary new installation is relatively affordable and could bring life to the most arid regions of desert. It could also serve as a template for colonizing other planets.  (Source: Exploration Architecture)

Lettuce is among the crops that can grow in the new seawater and solar-fueled greenhouse.
Project combines cutting edge agriculture, using greenhouses, with solar power to produce a variety of essentials

Many people look to space and wonder if we might one day colonize other planets or heavenly bodies such as Mars or the Moon.  Before such exotic steps can be taken, we must conquer hostile environments here on Earth, hopefully learning applicable knowledge along the way. 

Among the harshest environments in the world is the Sahara desert.  With intense sunlight heating the sand to fiery temperatures and with little water, few animals and even fewer humans are able to live in this region.  However, the same resources that make the Sahara so inhospitable have benefits as well.

The European Union has already proposed massive Saharan solar installations and infrastructure, including a €45B supergrid, which could take advantage of the intense sunlight to power the entire EU.  Now a new organization, the Sahara Forest Project, is aiming to create a sustainable infrastructure for human life in the desert.  The project provides perhaps an ideal proving ground for technologies that could someday be applied to space colonization efforts.

The project, run by British scientists, aims to use a combination of high-tech greenhouses and solar power to create food, water, and power -- all the essentials for human colonization -- in the harshest regions of the Sahara.

The plan is to use concentrated solar power (CSP), a high yield type of solar power, to power seawater evaporators to obtain freshwater.  The installation also powers pumps which pipe cool, damp air into the greenhouses lowering the temperature up to 15 degrees Celsius.  This allows sun-loving plants such as lettuces, peppers, cucumbers and tomatoes.

Charlie Paton, a member of the team who invented the seawater greenhouse concept, describes, "Plants need light for growth but they don't like heat beyond a certain point.  So we've got conditions in the greenhouse of high humidity and lower temperature.  The crops sitting in this slightly steamy, humid condition can grow fantastically well."

The greenhouse would produce demineralized water, which could be used to keep the CSP panels in top working order.  The waste heat from the CSP could be recaptured to evaporate even more seawater.

The project already has two working demo plants in Tenerife, Oman and the United Arab Emirates.  It says that for £65m it can build 20 hectares of greenhouse and a 10 MW CSP installation to power it.  At these relatively low costs, many Middle Eastern countries are expressing interest in the self-sustaining system.

Many say similar gains could be attained using permaculture farming practices.  However, the Sahara Forest Project has the added perk that it provides an ideal model for space colonization efforts.

The installation also sinks a great deal of carbon, and additionally it helps restore the desert ecosystem, which has been damaged by over-access of the limited underground water resources.



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Doesn't pass the smell test
By porkpie on 9/3/2008 9:10:23 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
The visionary new installation is relatively affordable...
If it uses solar power, I doubt that. Even here in America its too expensive to use without massive government subsidies. A self-contained solar station that uses a bunch of power to desalinate water and cool greenhouses? With everything tightly sealed to maintain temperature and humidity? Sounds about as pricey as a base on mars, minus the lifting costs.

Also the desert is usually very alkaline soil, which plants don't like much. So there's another cost to rectify that problem.




RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By therealnickdanger on 9/3/2008 9:36:31 PM , Rating: 3
Sandstorms and rolling dunes would bury solar panels in a heartbeat. I hear that sunlight doesn't shine very well through sand.

*For the record, I am indeed making a sweeping generalization about the location of this installation. I have no idea if this area is prone to either sandstorms or rolling dunes.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By Howard on 9/3/2008 10:03:41 PM , Rating: 2
This system would not use solar panels.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By atrabilious on 9/3/2008 11:26:34 PM , Rating: 2
No it'd use mirrors which can get covered by sand just as easily.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By Kiijibari on 9/4/2008 2:47:21 AM , Rating: 2
So what ?
Seems like you do not know nothing about deserts ...

At least consult wikipedia before posting:
quote:
Sand dunes called ergs and stony surfaces called hamada surfaces compose a minority of desert surfaces . Exposures of rocky terrain are typical, and reflect minimal soil development and sparseness of vegetation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert

cheers

Kiiji


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By atrabilious on 9/4/2008 9:43:25 AM , Rating: 3
Consulting Wikipedia doesn't make you an expert. Even rocky areas in the Sahara get exposed to enormous dust storms that can cover surfaces. Some of those storms are large enough to even blow dust all the way across the Atlantic.

Next think think before you post.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By JohnnyCNote on 9/4/08, Rating: -1
RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By Malhavoc on 9/3/2008 10:40:11 PM , Rating: 2
You don't have to grow the vegetables in the soil. I've been to about 30 vegetable greenhouses and not one has. Ones I've encountered use crap like coconut fibre and pump it full of fertilizers that are recirculated through the irrigation water.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By myhipsi on 9/4/2008 7:37:32 AM , Rating: 2
Hydroponics.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By TheDoc9 on 9/4/2008 10:37:55 AM , Rating: 3
Then the argument becomes how healthy is the plant for consumption. They are already using demineralized, distilled water. Who knows how many minerals and nutrients are in sand as it is, it's probably barely enough for the plant or worse.

They have a nice picture there, but unless I was starving I wouldn't eat anything that comes out of one of these places.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By TheDoc9 on 9/4/2008 10:39:53 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Ones I've encountered use crap like coconut fibre and pump it full of fertilizers that are recirculated through the irrigation water.


didn't read the last part, my mistake.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By Leeman on 9/4/08, Rating: 0
RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By porkpie on 9/5/2008 12:59:06 AM , Rating: 1
Sure, but you do know how expensive hydroponics is? Add to that solar power (very expensive), water desalination (very expensive), cooling and humidity control for the greenhouses (expensive), the need to pipe water several miles (slightly expensive) and all the maintenance for this, and you get lettuce thats $200 a head and $100 carrots.

Maybe on Mars. But not here.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By RU482 on 9/4/2008 10:44:42 AM , Rating: 2
Also, there is no mention of what they would do with all that salt from the ocean water.


RE: Doesn't pass the smell test
By Murloc on 9/5/2008 6:20:38 AM , Rating: 2
sell it.


By SoCalBoomer on 9/4/2008 3:21:36 PM , Rating: 2
Plants will likely be grown in a water solution - which is already being used elsewhere and quite successfully. Just search "hydroponic gardening lettuce" and you'll find a TON of info on it, from University of Florida to Wiki stuff.


By slashbinslashbash on 9/4/2008 12:22:25 AM , Rating: 5
Walk without rhythm, and it won't attract the worm!




By Spivonious on 9/4/2008 10:41:35 AM , Rating: 2
I'll just use my thumper.


By shin0bi272 on 9/4/2008 12:08:03 PM , Rating: 2
HL2 reference FTW


By HOOfan 1 on 9/4/2008 12:36:59 PM , Rating: 2
Considering the parent to your reply, it is more a Dune reference....where HL2 got the idea for the thumpers.


By Spivonious on 9/4/2008 4:55:30 PM , Rating: 2
Correctamundo.