Sand dune fixation: A solar‐powered Sahara seawater pipeline macroproject

Abstract

The paper proposes macro-engineering using tactical technologies that stabilize and vegetate barren near-coast sand dune fields with seawater. Seawater that would otherwise, as commonly postulated, increase the Earth-ocean volume. Anthropogenic saturation of the ground with pumped seawater should fix widespread active sand dune fields in deserts (such as the westernmost Sahara). Seawater extraction from the ocean, and its deposition on dune sand, is made via solar-powered pipeline. Stabilisation of one major erg in Mauritania is evaluated as a case study.

Transatlantic Freshwater Aqueduct

“…The TFA infrastructure is an oceanic macroengineering project proposal of greater complexity than any tackled previously (Schuiling et al 2005(Schuiling et al , 2007Badescu and Cathcart 2008) and, therefore, required to consider political risks, innovational risks, and organizational risks, weather extremes (in desert, jungle and oceanic), transient workforces, likely human labor construction errors, to name a few.…”

Sustainable Design of an Artificial Lake in Jafer Basin Based on Gravity Flow

“…An initial artificial Lake design was presented by Badescu et al [20]; where they proposed a pipeline to bring seawater to Lake Eyre in Australia. In an effort to solve the sand dunes expansion problem in Africa, Badescu et al [21] suggested bringing seawater from the ocean to the desert to fix the dunes by spraying them with seawater. Bonacci and Roje-Bonacci [22] studied the fluctuations in water levels at Baćina Lakes due to water evacuation through Krotuše tunnel to the Adriatic Sea.…”