Applying the Eden Project method to New Geography
Apropos of the Eden Project suggested in Installment 1 (Creation of a man-made riverbed across the Sahel of North Central Africa which would be fed by water from the Amazon River through deep-water pipelines across the Atlantic.):
Notable and Adjacent Benefits
Envisioning Job Opportunities
Imagine the number of jobs associated with such a huge project.
Think of the jobs that would be created in manufacturing, installing, and maintaining the deep water pipes which would be necessary for the twenty-seven-hundred mile pipe line across the Atlantic Ocean.
Think of the number of jobs that would be created to: dredge the river bed; line the riverbed where necessary; house the workers; provision the workers.
Think of the armies of workers, many of whom would stay on after the completion of the river to become citizens and found communities.
Think of the villages that would arise and attract services and the workers needed to provide the services.
Yes, the river project would probably take on some of the aspects of any boom economy. But, for starters, the project would not have the more egregious negatives associated with boom economies engaged in the extraction of minerals. No arsenic as is used in mining gold; no chemicals as used in “fracking” for oil in shale; no strip mining for coal.
A Chance for Worldwide Renewal
Think of the new river as a permanent, flowing oasis.
As long as the Amazon keeps flowing, the new river would keep flowing, being the conduit for sustenance across a vast arid plane; providing environmental benefits for the African continent and for the entire global community; fighting desertification; combating global warming. This huge project could be the start of renewal and growth for the entire world. It could be a chance for peaceful international commitment to sustained growth and economic security for millions of the earth’s citizens. Plus. Think of the lessening of sea level rise by diverting water that would have gone into the Atlantic Ocean.
Addressing Concerns About the Amazon's Integrity
Imagine the water from one 6’ diameter pipe floated at half capacity, approximately 19,800 gallons per minute.
Imagine six tubes bound together in twos. Approximately 118,800 gpm. Imagine six bundles of six tubes.
Since the Amazon is as wide as it is (1 mile – 6.2 miles), and since the Amazon is as deep as it is (66 feet – 160 feet), we could add many bundled tubes and provide for a man-made river the size of the Pascagoula River in Mississippi, with a flow of 1000 cubic feet per second. Or larger.
Worried that we might damage the integrity of the Amazon by siphoning off that much water? The average flow of the Amazon River into the Atlantic Ocean is 4,200,000 cubic feet per second, an estimated seven times the discharge of the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico.
