The Great Green Wall is ambitious in scope, but composed of relatively simple parts: capturing rain-water with berms, planting the right kinds of plants in the right order, and creating a system of ecologically sound incentives for people to participate in the project. It's wonderful to learn about.
Andrew Millison, the creator of the linked YouTube video, has an interesting channel where he essentially showcases applications of / advances in ecological technology (i.e., permaculture.) I take some solace in the fact that his videos get millions of views; suggesting that permaculture / ecological design principles aren't some fringe-y thing any more.
> As of 2023, the Great Green Wall was reported as "facing the risk of collapse" due to terrorist threats, absence of political leadership, and insufficient funding. “The Sahel countries have not allocated any spending in their budgets for this project. They are only waiting on funding from abroad, whether from the European Union, the African Union, or others.” said Issa Garba, an environmental activist from Niger, who also described the 2030 guideline as an unattainable goal. Amid the existing stagnation, a growing number of voices have called for scrapping the project.
If there is money and resources to build and maintain such walls, there should be more will and good intentions to build green walls which are more useful.
"Israel’s Yatir Forest has been hailed as a green refuge in the Negev that is helping fight climate change. But some Israeli ecologists now contend that it has wiped out important desert ecosystems and shows that forestation projects are not always an unalloyed environmental good."
https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-israel-questions-are-raise...
My question is are there downstream effects? The planting techniques are fascinating but the water that they are capturing surely was going some where, right? However little the stream may be, how do they do this without messing up people who are downstream?
It doesn't necessarily work like that. Vegitation can cause more rain rather than just taking water from elsewhere. A striking example is the Loess plateau, in China which went from dessert to green. Article mentioning it:
I have to imagine a lot of it evaporated because it wasn't being captured, and then others became runoff that may have gone out to sea if it had been raining too hard.
They discuss this in the video, and if you watched it you’ll notice that they’re doing these projects along a major river near the ocean. They only capture 15% or so of what is today run off into the river. Rivers ultimately flow into the ocean. There is no one really downstream depending on that small percent of runoff.
A lot of interesting takes in the comments where growing more plants will somehow cause ecological disaster. The only exception I can see is diverting water to support it. Otherwise, I have never heard such a thing.
Just off the top of my head: kudzu, skull weed, and tamarisk. I’m sure there are many more examples. Just because you are unaware of something doesn’t exist.
It seems crazy to me that after we've had so many unintended consequences preventing earth's natural processes using technology, the same crowd is now celebrating using technology to prevent yet another of earth's natural processes. Regardless of your position on the Sahara desert, it's been growing since Roman times.
Personally, I'm in favor of the use of technology to affect the planet, but it seems to me that the public reception to these ideas is mostly around who's doing the deed. Often, when someone in a rich country proposes something like this, the argument will be something about capitalism. However, when a poor country does it, despite it also being about wealth at the end of the day, it's lauded. Now again, I'm totally in favor of all these efforts and totally understand why people do it. It's just a duality I've noticed; and I'm not sure what to think about it.
Why does that seem crazy to you? Some artificial interventions in the earth's natural processes are bad for humans (global warming, increased rate of desertification) and some interventions are good for humans (increasing land available for sustainable food production, killing malaria carrying mosquitos).
There isn't some "human interventions good/human interventions bad" duality. Some are good some are bad. We should stop doing to bad things and do more of the good things. We should continuously audit for new effects caused by our actions are adjust accordingly to achieve the best outcomes for human life.
Do hand-dug berms planted with native and non-invasive plants count as technology?
And is increasing desertification one of earth's natural processes or is it an effect of technology, specifically technology we've used to pull massive amounts of carbon out of the ground and add it to the atmosphere?
Not trying to be hostile, just questioning some of your assumptions.
Humans and technology have been around a lot longer than Rome. Do you think desertification is a completely natural process that has nothing to do with the humans who live in the area and what they do with the land?
It's not about "who does the deed". It's about who accrues the benefits, and who has a stake.
Without a strong local stake, the only projects that work are resource extraction projects. These have a tendency to create dependencies, and strong political instability.
There's also the fact that many technocratic proposals from rich countries never progress past first order thinking: "Trees missing, add trees here". Again, a function of skin in the game - rich nations overwhelmingly operate on a form of capitalism that prioritizes short term wins, and they're not around for the cleanup after that. This is why you want a local stake - not due to theoretical arguments around capitalism or colonialism, but because you want to make sure the people who own the consequences are part of the process. Which usually leads to better outcomes.
> using technology to prevent yet another of earth's natural processes.
Agriculture prevents a lot of earth's natural processes and has been doing so for millennia. We, as humans living in a relatively advanced civilization prevent earth's natural process just by living an urban area. I really don't see your point.
> using technology to prevent yet another of earth's natural processes
I mean it's literally just planting trees, grasses, and shrubs. This isn't dumping a cargo ship of iron filings into the sea or putting a solar sail in front of the sun, it's putting seeds in the ground. If you want to call that "technology" I suppose it's technically true, but it's almost laughable.
I respect the right of Africa to try and reforest, but logically the most likely outcome is that the Amazon will start to die from the lack of the 30 million tons of dust and sand that fall on the Amazon each year from the Sahara.
Should Africa's desert be preserved to feed the Amazon? That's a question humanity seems ill equipped to answer.
YossarianFrPrez|2 years ago
Andrew Millison, the creator of the linked YouTube video, has an interesting channel where he essentially showcases applications of / advances in ecological technology (i.e., permaculture.) I take some solace in the fact that his videos get millions of views; suggesting that permaculture / ecological design principles aren't some fringe-y thing any more.
karaterobot|2 years ago
> As of 2023, the Great Green Wall was reported as "facing the risk of collapse" due to terrorist threats, absence of political leadership, and insufficient funding. “The Sahel countries have not allocated any spending in their budgets for this project. They are only waiting on funding from abroad, whether from the European Union, the African Union, or others.” said Issa Garba, an environmental activist from Niger, who also described the 2030 guideline as an unattainable goal. Amid the existing stagnation, a growing number of voices have called for scrapping the project.
fnordian_slip|2 years ago
dang|2 years ago
Africa is building a Great Green Wall to prevent expansion of the Sahara - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39466851 - Feb 2024 (68 comments)
begueradj|2 years ago
Morocco also has similar and several walls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moroccan_Western_Sahara_Wall
If there is money and resources to build and maintain such walls, there should be more will and good intentions to build green walls which are more useful.
logifail|2 years ago
There seems to be a certain amount of dissent.
"Mass tree-planting programs in the desert often cause lasting damage to the ecosystems they are purportedly trying to repair." https://www.noemamag.com/if-the-desert-was-green/
"Israel’s Yatir Forest has been hailed as a green refuge in the Negev that is helping fight climate change. But some Israeli ecologists now contend that it has wiped out important desert ecosystems and shows that forestation projects are not always an unalloyed environmental good." https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-israel-questions-are-raise...
thinkingtoilet|2 years ago
tim333|2 years ago
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/20/our-bigg...
pwthornton|2 years ago
fnordpiglet|2 years ago
unknown|2 years ago
[deleted]
micromacrofoot|2 years ago
unknown|2 years ago
[deleted]
robbyiq999|2 years ago
fnordpiglet|2 years ago
LastTrain|2 years ago
deegles|2 years ago
droningparrot|2 years ago
The Great Green Wall is more open in that anyone can contribute to its construction. All you need is a shovel and some seeds.
unknown|2 years ago
[deleted]
anon291|2 years ago
Personally, I'm in favor of the use of technology to affect the planet, but it seems to me that the public reception to these ideas is mostly around who's doing the deed. Often, when someone in a rich country proposes something like this, the argument will be something about capitalism. However, when a poor country does it, despite it also being about wealth at the end of the day, it's lauded. Now again, I'm totally in favor of all these efforts and totally understand why people do it. It's just a duality I've noticed; and I'm not sure what to think about it.
battery_glasses|2 years ago
There isn't some "human interventions good/human interventions bad" duality. Some are good some are bad. We should stop doing to bad things and do more of the good things. We should continuously audit for new effects caused by our actions are adjust accordingly to achieve the best outcomes for human life.
standeven|2 years ago
And is increasing desertification one of earth's natural processes or is it an effect of technology, specifically technology we've used to pull massive amounts of carbon out of the ground and add it to the atmosphere?
Not trying to be hostile, just questioning some of your assumptions.
skywhopper|2 years ago
groby_b|2 years ago
Without a strong local stake, the only projects that work are resource extraction projects. These have a tendency to create dependencies, and strong political instability.
There's also the fact that many technocratic proposals from rich countries never progress past first order thinking: "Trees missing, add trees here". Again, a function of skin in the game - rich nations overwhelmingly operate on a form of capitalism that prioritizes short term wins, and they're not around for the cleanup after that. This is why you want a local stake - not due to theoretical arguments around capitalism or colonialism, but because you want to make sure the people who own the consequences are part of the process. Which usually leads to better outcomes.
maximinus_thrax|2 years ago
Agriculture prevents a lot of earth's natural processes and has been doing so for millennia. We, as humans living in a relatively advanced civilization prevent earth's natural process just by living an urban area. I really don't see your point.
wara23arish|2 years ago
bastawhiz|2 years ago
I mean it's literally just planting trees, grasses, and shrubs. This isn't dumping a cargo ship of iron filings into the sea or putting a solar sail in front of the sun, it's putting seeds in the ground. If you want to call that "technology" I suppose it's technically true, but it's almost laughable.
debacle|2 years ago
Should Africa's desert be preserved to feed the Amazon? That's a question humanity seems ill equipped to answer.