Reply To: Fusion X-prize petition started!

[Rezwan]

Using desalinization technology will be very helpful to reversing desertification, but more important is how we use land. In fact, even without major power plants, we may be able to reverse desertification. Animal impact plays a key (and highly misunderstood) role in the growth of grass and in maintaining ground cover: http://managingwholes.com/animal-impact.htm

The grass is very important to the water cycle. Here is a great flash slideshow on the water cycle which explains how ground cover affects the lands ability to capture water and build aquifers. So, even if you have all these fusion powered desal plants, but the ground cover isn’t there, the water is just going right back into the atmosphere: http://managingwholes.com/flash/wcSlideshow.htm As the show says:

In the next few minutes, you’ll learn about basic processes that cause most of the world’s floods and droughts. These processes are widely ignored or misunderstood.

Dams, irrigation, and deeper wells cannot solve the real problem: wasted rainfall

Other stats:

Many landscapes lose over 90% of rainfall from a combination of evaporation and runoff.

Healthy grasslands can absorb 75% of rainfall. That’s 7 1/2 times more rain to grow plants and recharge rivers!

Now we just need a flash slideshow about animal impact. Seeing is understanding.

And finally, a great book: Gardener’s of Eden – http://www.oaec.org/node/125?PHPSESSID=9962160c3ad7cfe38019d92666f9f9b0

I got turned on to this stuff by the holistic management folks. http://www.holisticmanagement.org