Red Sea dam

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The so-called Red Sea dam is a speculative macro-engineering proposal put forward in 2007 by a group of scientists and engineers[1]. The proposal has attracted both criticism and ridicule[2] although the authors' intention seems to have been to explore "the ethical and environmental dilemmas and some of the political implications of macro-engineering".

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[edit] Proposal

The idea is to dam the Red Sea at its southern end where the Bab-al-Mandab Strait is only 18 miles wide. Natural evaporation would rapidly lower the level of the enclosed Red Sea. Water allowed back into the sea would drive turbines to generate electricity. It is claimed that up to 50 gigawatts would be generated, dwarfing all other power schemes. However, this level of output might not be achieved for up to three centuries when the Red Sea had shrunk to a fraction of its current size and the sea level had dropped by hundreds of metres.

[edit] Implications

The proposal's authors point out that "Macro-engineering projects of this size cause a massive destruction of existing ecologies", a point emphasized by critics[3] who can point to the damage caused by current, far smaller schemes.

The authors claim "Green" credentials for the idea: "On the positive side of the environmental scale, however, are the big reductions of greenhouse gas emissions, and the reduced pace of fossil hydrocarbon resource exhaustion".

Influential scientists such as Peter Bosshard[4], policy director of the International Rivers Network, have condemned the scheme as ludicrous. Dr. Bosshard is not an oceanographer of course.

What some influential scientists have very intentionally overlooked, however, is the same authors earlier macro-project proposal for a Hormuz Strait Dam mentioned in the text and cited fully. [R.D. Schuiling, V. Badescu, R.B. Cathcart and P.A.L.C. van Overveld, "The Hormuz Strait Dam Macroproject--21st Century Electricity Development Infrastructure Node (EDIN)?", MARINE GEORESOURCES AND GEOTECHNOLOGY 23: 25-37 (2005).] The Hormuz Strait Dam installation was found to be Green, practical, efficient and timely! The Red Sea Dam proposal is an intellectual follow-up, meant to examine the practicality of such infrastructure in other suitable places from a theoretical standpoint.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Power from closing the Red Sea: economic and ecological costs and benefits following the isolation of the Red Sea by Roelof Dirk Schuiling, Viorel Badescu, Richard B. Cathcart, Jihan Seoud, Jaap C. Hanekamp
  2. ^ New Scientist critique
  3. ^ Live Science on the environmental impact
  4. ^ Dive magazine quoting the International Rivers Network

[edit] External links

Gibraltar Strait Dam Macroprojects by Richard Cathcart, one of the authors of the Red Sea Dam proposal