Caspia

karov · 2014-05-13 00:14:47

Back on Earth.

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Imagine if we had REAL Nuclear Age and ...:

Mega-project for "peaceful utilization of nuclear explosives" and geo-engineering/terraformation of the Caspian sea area.
The sea is 28 metres bellow the World ocean level.

Ref.s:
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedan_Crater ,
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedan_(nuclear_test) ,
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Plowshare ,
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peacefu...ear_explosions ,
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peacefu...tional_Economy,
and escpecially the film:
6. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUr7EVc44f8

super-version of the Op.Plowshare's offshot - the Panatomic canal proposal for Nicaragua.

From the mouth of Don River at Rostov-on-Don to Kransoarmeysk rajon of Volgograd. ( where the elevation is around zero ), following the bed of Don and Volga-Don canal ( + some under Asov sea to let smoother flooding )...

About 600 km long "atomic canal" - hundres of meters wide and dozens to hundreds meters deep. ( about twice the linear dimensions of the proposed in 1960es Nicaraguan Panatomic canal ).

Several thousand of hundreds of kT range devices, burried deep enough to avoid almost all fallout issues.

Lower Don disappears turned into a "oceanic passage". Caspian basin fills up to the world ocean level. No locks, no dams.

Caspian countries become instantly Mediterranean ones...

The best map I could find :: http://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet … Cseries_no

and

Last edited by karov (2014-05-13 06:21:01)

karov · 2014-05-23 04:50:13

?

Void · 2014-05-23 05:35:11

OK, I will play.

Supposing the nations with coastlines consented due to the value of the change, it also could reduce the supposed rise in sea levels in the major oceans, but just a little.

I once had thought that if sea water could be impounded into basins in the North American great basin, then evaporation and the rings of mountains would generate much fresh water. Impractical as far as I can see, for the needed energy, the disposal of accumulated salts, and also there are very few people who really want to do the real work needed to establish the infrastructure in my tribes at this time (Most of them want to do fake work involving a desk, meetings, and general red tape (Ape) interference with getting things done, and of course pay unmerited).

But your Caspia plan makes more sense than that.

A sort of local Terraforming on Earth it seems.

Last edited by Void (2014-05-23 05:38:55)

Tom Kalbfus · 2014-05-23 10:56:23

One place we could terraform might be Antarctica. Suppose we wanted to create a region in Antarctica that was warm enough to support vegetation. Say we had a mirror focusing light onto a 160 km square region of Antarctica so it would be warmer, a sort of "green valley" surrounded by glaciers.

JoshNH4H · 2014-05-23 11:46:08

A global sea level rise of 1.5 m represents 5e14 m^3 of water. To put this water into an area the size of the Caspian sea, you would need 1.4 km of water.

Perhaps we would be better off digging a sea somewhere? The Sahara desert strikes me as being a good place; If we could dig up an area let's say half the size of Libya, the sea would only need to be 300 m deep, on average.

Tom Kalbfus · 2014-05-23 12:26:52

How about sealing off the Arctic Ocean? If we could make it a lake, how much water could we put into it?

JoshNH4H · 2014-05-23 20:53:19

If we're talking about the part of the arctic ocean that would be relatively easy to seal off, we're looking at about 1e7 km^2, so that means that a rise of 50 m would be needed to account for a global rise of 1.5 m.

RobertDyck · 2014-05-23 22:37:54

Yea, when I was a kid I dreamed of the poles melting. Antarctica and Canada's arctic would become liveable, perhaps with agriculture. In fact, palaeontologists found evidence of a taiga forest on Antarctica at the time of the dinosaurs. "Taiga" means forest on permafrost, such as Canada's Northwest Territories or Alaska. So perhaps not wheat fields, but something.

The problem with that is rise of oceans. All the floating ice of the north polar ice cap could melt without increasing ocean level a millimetre, but ice on land? Melting Antarctica would rise ocean level significantly.

The purpose of this discussion was "Caspia". Be very careful. That would flood a lot of land. Who lives there? How much agriculture would be lost? Any industry? How much would losing that land cost? And flooding the Caspian Sea would change salinity, it would fill from the Black Sea, gaining salinity of the Black Sea. One thing to keep in mind is what happened to the Black Sea itself. In 5,550 BC the Bosporus opened. That flooded the fresh water lake with water from the Aegean Sea, covering fresh water with salt water. Fresh doesn't mix with salt water, not in a large body. That fresh water is still down there, sealed off from oxygen. The fresh water fish died, and salt water fish can't reach the bottom because swimming below the halocline will expose them to fresh water. And zero oxygen.

Another "warning" is Aral Sea. Russia engaged in a major irrigation project. That cut off river water from Aral Lake. The lake drastically shrunk and became salt. Now it's called a "sea". That destroyed an active fishery. Salt dirt from the dried up sea was blown by wind, eventually the farm land became salted as well.

Void · 2014-05-24 10:08:26

This is a entertaining post.
I very much have reservations about any alteration of Earth, for political reasons. We would put up with massive nonsense, humans being what they are.

I do say that yes the Caspian offers the best opportunity to mitigate rising oceans.

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

I say as well that if we had a different economy as perhaps some day will exist. An abundant energy source and robots that don't want to exterminate us but help us, we might suppose other things of the kind, such as Nevada of North America being a land of seas with green mountain ranges. Or the deep basin of China north of Tibet also being a sea.

Why? For the fresh water. Evaporation would condense on the mountain ranges. The great basin is I think the best hope for that silly notion. China's chance requires even more human capability. But yes, just the filling of Caspia? will protect such shore lines as we have now. That's a lot of valuable real estate. It is not a stupid notion. When you set the plan of filling the Caspian basin with more water against the need to protect Holland, and New York and pacific island nations, perhaps it is a sensible plan.

Karov, you started this, will you check in? :-)

RobertDyck, I have a problem with what you have said. No fresh water layer could persist below a heavier salt layer. It can't be correct. Salt water sinks in the presence of fresh water unless it is very much warmer. Can you correct this unhappy not understanding?

Last edited by Void (2014-05-24 10:16:15)

RobertDyck · 2014-05-24 11:03:21

I have been told many times that the Black Sea still has salt water above cold fresh water. Still to this day. The fresh water does not mix with salt water, so the fresh water ran out of oxygen millennia ago.

Nature does a lot of weird things. One ocean current flows from under the north polar ice cap, through the Bering straight into the Bering Sea, and south into the Pacific Ocean. When the cold arctic water hits the continental shelf, the weird thing happens. Cold water continues to flow on top, over warmer temperate Pacific waters. This is again weird: cold water flowing on top of warmer. But this is very important for a few reasons. The cold arctic water carries a lot of nutrients, which feed fish. It also results in cold surface water for the mid-Pacific. Once in a while, every so many years, the current "flips". The cold water hugs the ocean floor. When this happens, fish of the tropical and equatorial Pacific are starved of nutrients. This devastates the fishery, so fishermen have only a fraction of the fish available. It also means warm tropical water stays at the ocean surface. That warms air above the ocean. That warm wet air is El Niño. It results in warmer weather in North American, and a lot more rain. That rain means when air currents reach Africa, it has a lot less rain.

Weird, huh?

Another weird weather thing. Wind storms in deserts of the Sahara kick up dust into the upper atmosphere. Wind blows that dust all the way west across the Atlantic to Americas: Caribbean and northern part of South America. Rain forests of the Americas count on that top soil. They couldn't survive without it. And these upper atmosphere winds flow east-to-west, backward from the west-to-east that we're used to. The west-to-east flow delivers rain to Africa, but that air has to go somewhere.

Last edited by RobertDyck (2014-05-24 23:32:17)

Void · 2014-05-24 20:50:13

The second time I try to respond and then my post is vanished.

Anyway thank you for your patience.

I was helped to understand by your response.

Void · 2014-05-24 20:59:18

The human race is not ready for an logical management of Earth. If they were, then they would understand that a very big change is going to occur, What was cannot continue. It is very sad I do not wish for what might come. They have demanded it by their actions however.

karov · 2014-05-27 06:55:53

RobertDyck wrote:

I have been told many times that the Black Sea still has salt water above cold fresh water. Still to this day. The fresh water does not mix with salt water, so the fresh water ran out of oxygen millennia ago.

Wrong. I live at the Black sea. It stretches vast under my balcony. NO fresh water beneath, but because it is 3 times less salty then the World ocean, and because it is semi-closed ( only one exit-entrance = the Bosporus ), AND mainly because til 7500 years ago it was closed fresh water basin ( most probably the cradle of the civilization ) with dozens of meters lower then the World ocean surface, it has high H2S concentration on debths over 100ish meters.

Black sea is an example for Med-ing of Caspia because diging a canal under the bed of Lower Don, would pour water into Caspian sea to fill up to the World ocean level ( of "Zero meters" ). It shall be a flood and turning the present day Caspian sea ( lake ) into *Caspia ( branch of Med, branch of World ocean ) shall happen in mere weeks...

Med-ed ( or oceanized ) Caspia will double in surface. I guess that will double the evaporation rate in the area too, and will increase precipitaton / rain in the surrounding deserts greening them and possibly helping Aral sea to get restored.

The geopolitical consequences will be serious turning Iran and Central Asia and Volgo-Ural and Eastern Caucasus areas into Mediterranian countries...

About the fragility of ecosystems and sensitivity of climate I do not agree. The Eocene Earth shows that better oceanic circulation = globally more benign climate... more heat = more moisture = no ice, no deserts.

Perhaps super-version of Nicaraguan or Caspian pan-atomic canals would be to open canals between the cotinents so ocean currents to circulate better. Yes 50-60m higher oceanic levels = loss of lands, but the gain from lack of ice and hot deserts would be much much bigger.

RobertDyck · 2014-05-27 09:58:28

karov wrote:

Wrong. I live at the Black sea. It stretches vast under my balcony. NO fresh water beneath, but because it is 3 times less salty then the World ocean, and because it is semi-closed ( only one exit-entrance = the Bosporus ), AND mainly because til 7500 years ago it was closed fresh water basin ( most probably the cradle of the civilization ) with dozens of meters lower then the World ocean surface, it has high H2S concentration on debths over 100ish meters.

Ok. You live there. I got this from a documentary of research by a pair of scientists. They tried to find the real event that inspired the myth of the flood described in the Bible, and the story of Noah's Arc. They suspected there was a real flood, just not quite as depicted. After all, "the world" for people who have to walk everywhere is quite small. And "the great flood" is referenced by many cultures, many older than the Old Testament. The oldest (that I know of) is the Epic of Gilgamesh, recorded in cuneiform on clay tablets. It makes passing reference to "the great flood". The tablets have been dated to 2600 BC.

The Mediterranean flooded when the Straights of Gibraltar opened, but that was 5.33 millions of years ago, before humans evolved, when dinosaurs roamed. So that can't be it. But what is now called the Black Sea flooded in 5,550 BC. Archaeologists found agriculture started around the shores of that lake. For centuries (millennia?) the only agriculture in the world was along the shores of that lake. Everyone else were hunter/gatherers. When the lake flooded, they had to leave or die. Agriculture quickly expanded to the rest of Europe and the Middle East. Agriculture in Mesopotamia came from that event. These two scientists assert that was the "flood" described in the Bible. Of course, that mean waters never did recede. Archaeologists found people displaced moved elsewhere, including into abandoned villages in Turkey. That was just one of many places, but the fact there were buildings in Turkey tells me there was civilization before that, just not agriculture. But agriculture allowed people to remain in one place, not having to move with wildlife. And allowed much larger populations. It was a key technology that built the civilization we know today. It is fair to say the Black Sea was the cradle of civilization.

About the fragility of ecosystems and sensitivity of climate I do not agree.

My argument isn't to do nothing. I'm not saying the world will end. What I am saying is the world is very complex, that any proposal has to be very carefully studied to determine all effects before you undertake anything like this.

karov · 2014-05-29 02:34:00

RobertDyck,

Very good and exact summary of the Black sea as cradle of civilization. Thank you. ( funny enough the oldest found technologically processed gold - these several kilos of priest-king? ornamentation were probably the only processed gold which mankind had for millenia - is in Varna Museum - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varna_Necropolis - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gumelni%C5 … vo_culture )

This "flood" coincided with one very important technology adoption too - domestication of the horse which combined with agriculture gave 7500 years ago the leading edge ( up to now and still going ) to the aka "indoeuropeans" - as cultural community OF COURSE, not talking about bulshit counter-scientific "racial" concepts.

The flood most probably made them to disperse - from Eire to Burma in NW-SE direction and from Spain to Manchuria in SW-NE direction, the horse made it possible to happen. The industrial age built upon millenia of capital accumulation initiated with agriculture, made possible the next leap - the early industrial age trans-continental settlement.

BUT, this is the deep past / roots.

For *Caspia I'm interested in climate and hydrology and ecological implications. Anybody have a clue?

Void · 2014-05-29 05:39:24

For me the issue is planetary cultural sanity. If so called green house effect is true, then mustering the human race to address it in a rational manner is sadly not true. Someone will want to sell their hydrocarbons, and someone will be desperate enough to buy and burn them.

I am not in love with the don't do that people either. The ones who say OK, you had a life, but now you should settle for sleeping with vermin and please fade away without discomforting us with your whining. (While they just wallow in their own inportance).

Caspia, is perhaps the most do-able project, a splint for a broken leg, since we cannot prevent the human race from being irrational, perhaps our asian cousins can flip the human race a favor. If the sea levels are to rise, and if the Iranians and Russians are to have to0 little water (In that area), and if Holland is to loose it's polders, and if the south sea nations are to become under water, then a sector of humanity might find a way to change the future. Protect important human property (The coastlines of the great ocean, and the productive structures that are there). Buy a little time.

The North American project would yield much fresh water, and earth quakes for a time, but it is beyond our technological, social, energy, and economic powers at this time.

They are in a period of incompetence just now, and the thing asked is massive. It is pointless to play at that table. Either you guys will handle this matter, or no-one will.

Last edited by Void (2014-05-29 05:42:00)

Tom Kalbfus · 2014-05-29 05:57:05

The cheapest thing to do would be just to move to higher ground. Their is never enough water to flood the entire Earth. If Antarctica was in the middle of the Pacific, there would be no variation of ocean level with climate change.

Void · 2014-05-29 11:21:33

The options are to manipulate or adapt.

Cheep does not necessarily get you the best things.

The value of the constructed objects on the collective shores of the whole Earth for the connected oceanic waters must be massive.
To seek an option to protect those assets, by dumping excess ocean water into a lower than sea level depression is worth considering.
Particularly if that would then give the adjacent countries more fish, shoreline, and to some extent more rain.

Having a stable shore line is also of value.

You move everything inland, and then in 50 years have to do it again....That would soak up a lot of wealth, and make everyone poorer.

Not that I am against adaptation. A pressure to adapt weeds out the non-adaptive, who typically are specialists who spend most of their time blocking progress, and soaking up the wealth, and expending it on more of them.

But in this case I am not looking for a genetically better human race, rather the preservation of wealth, the better to use to to extend to space travel.

Tom Kalbfus · 2014-05-29 11:42:46

How old do you want your buildings to be? Stands to reason that we are eventually going to replace most of them over time anyway, if the ocean is rising, it isn't doing so very fast. You might just get the maximum use of your shoreline buildings and then they'll have to be condemned and torn down anyway and replaced with new buildings, those new buildings could be built at higher elevations, in fact all we may need is a zoning law that prevents the construction of new buildings near the shore line, and eventually the old buildings will come down and not be replaced. Perhaps a fund ought to be established to compensate those people who lose their property due to a rising ocean level. the Ocean was at one time lower than it is now and people built settlements on the shore of that ocean, there is archaeological evidence for this. Panicking about the Oceans rising is just silly, it is not the same thing as a tidal wave or a flood. A rising ocean level is gradual, people will have plenty of time to move. So engineering the Earth to preserve old structures is just plain silly.

Void · 2014-05-29 12:37:56

That wasn't nice

Panicking about the Oceans rising is just silly, it is not the same thing as a tidal wave or a flood. A rising ocean level is gradual, people will have plenty of time to move. So engineering the Earth to preserve old structures is just plain silly.

Really, measure the board, then cut it.

Karovs issue is he wants to create Caspia. It is interesting, because it is a notion to teraform Earth. If it has value I guess it could be considered, but I think Karov just likes to exercise his imagination and other skills.

I am not panicking. I live quite far above the water line in fact.

After taking proper measurements, it may be decided that "engineering the Earth to preserve old structures is just plain silly" or not. One interesting point is that the Dutch might be interested in helping the Caspian nations do that engineering. And I would not necessarily dismiss the notion that New York City and other such places might be willing to help finance and engineer such a project, to protect their own interests.

Last edited by Void (2014-05-29 12:40:30)

karov · 2014-05-30 06:25:48

How much would lower the World ocean level the flooding of *Caspia, indeed?

Void · 2014-05-30 12:30:37

It is only 92 feet below sea level, so maybe just a bit of help. But there are some other places.

Glandu · 2014-06-02 08:09:37

I've heard the same about the Qattara Depression.

Void · 2014-06-02 10:25:18

Yes, the Dead Sea as well.

The Salton Sea, in North America for instance, but for that one I don't expect that reason will rule.

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

If the Colorado river had been allowed to fill that basin, and then have an outlet to the sea, that area of desert could be productive aquatic agriculture.

Of course now the water is wanted elsewhere, and the farms in depression will not be allowed to flood.

There are likely too many vested interests that would fight it tooth and nail.

Then there is Death Valley

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

But for that one there are serious problems with lifting the water over into it's brim. Of course you could capture hydroelectric energy from the water as it then descended, but there would also be a problem of accumulating salt.

On the bright side, once water was put into the valley it might fall as rain several times, perhaps 7 times.

But again, it would probabably be impossible to make such a change, now that the area is controlled by vested interests, and those types of people who feel "Natural" is how things should be.

Tom Kalbfus · 2014-06-02 10:38:01

I don't see much difference from eliminating land here in low depressions or eliminating land on the coast. So what are you going to do? Flood the farmer's fields so rich people living on the coast can keep their summer homes?

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