The Seas Canal and Intelligent Alternatives
No man?s land
The seas canal project and intelligent alternatives One of the grandiose ideas Israel has ?amused? herself with over 60 years of existence is the Seas Canal Project to connect the Dead Sea with the Mediterranean: studying the subject a bit, checking out alternatives, listening for reactions - in Israel, the world, the neighbors - but never really daring to implement it. And not without good reason.
The plan to dig a canal between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea was conceived already in 1899 by Max Werkert - an engineer who proposed a course crossing the Yizrael Valley and Beit She?an to the Jordan River, curving, as the maps show, between the Kinneret and the Dead Sea. The idea was published two years later in Herzl?s book ?Altneuland?, as proof that the Jewish state to arise would have the necessary energy resources for its existence, with no dependence on the energy sources of a hostile surrounding.
In the search for energy sources, with the establishment of the state fifty years later, the idea again arose, but - with no chance of obtaining the required financing for the enormous undertaking - it has since remained a romantic dream. In 1977 when Israel realized she was about to lose the vast oil resources of the Sinai Peninsula, it was decided to check the feasibility of the canal project again, and this time rigorously. However, scientist Prof. Yuval Ne?eman, who was entrusted with studying the proposal, estimated the cost of the project at $1.5 billion, and advised against carrying it out for unforeseeable environmental ramifications.
Fortunately, the country?s leaders, accustomed to elections about every two years, refrain from entering into projects whose fruit will be picked by their successors, and the canal vision just continues to run around inside their heads, or more precisely - their consultants?, who occasionally pull it out of their hats like rabbits, especially for the media?s needs.
Precisely as expected, we have lately been informed that the President of the State, Shimon Peres, having consulted with the charming actor Leonardo de Caprio, decided to lift the gauntlet and to push for the project, in his manner - despite all the objectors. At the same time, so it is heard, businessman Yitzhak Tshuva has appropriated the ?original? idea as his own personal vision - which is quite worrisome, as the man, considered one of the richest in the world, has already realized a number of dreams in his life.
Building canals to improve the geographical reality is not a new phenomenon. The end of the 19th century saw many of them around the globe, the most well-known being the Suez Canal, completed in 1869, and through which 10% of the world?s ships sail; the Panama Canal, 1889, between the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic, saving ships 13,000 km and gleaning Panama 80% of its national income; and the Corinth Canal in the Peloponnesus. Though not free of inflicting damage upon their surroundings, these and their like save vast amounts of energy, and improve the quality of life of millions.
Contrary to these projects, which do not try too hard to mess with the Act of Creation, the Seas Canal Project diametrically opposes it. Just for comparison, the difference between the two oceans is less than twenty cm, while the level gap between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, which happens to lie at the lowest place on earth, is 420 m. (!!!). One can only guess at the consequences of flowing enormous quantities of salt water across the fertile soil, but from the little already researched it is clear that the action might end in an ecological disaster.
Moreover - there is no chance in the world that the project will deliver the goods, namely, to supply a profitable and enduring source of energy, while raising the level of the Dead Sea without harming its unique biological composition. It is already clear that the energy put into digging the canal and building the bridges to cross it will never be returned, if only for the fact that the small sea will quickly be filled up, and - with no water - the power turbines will have to cease operating.
From this point on the plan only gets more and more complicated in the search for solutions to the problems created as solutions to previous problems. Thus for instance, alternative lakes created for the superfluous sea water will not only saline the ground-water, but will ultimately get filled up as well, to which say the geniuses of the generation, who can?t solve the water problems of Israel - we?ll use the redundant water for desalination.
According to this Clochemerle logic, one might actually ask: why not desalinate sea water directly from the Mediterranean, to prevent overpumping of the Kinneret water, whose overflow is intended, according to God?s original plan, to balance out the amount of water of the Dead Sea? And if we?re already speaking of creating lakes, why not use them to contain the rain water flowing freely into the sea? The Nabateans already proved it works in 300 BC, and big time!
All this does not belittle the impending ecological disaster to the Dead Sea, even without this project. On the contrary, the phosphate plant which has abused as it wishes for years, the natural process of drying up, the ensuing vultures, and the receding water line harming the tourist value of a geographical resource, one of the most unique in the world - all these cry out to the skies - or waters. In the background stands, of course, the missed chance for co-operation with our neighbor to the east, Jordan, which had the idea in the 70s for a canal along the border with Israel, but ultimately understood that a 200 km. pipeline is better - again, without really understanding what the price can be. What?s embarrassing is that Peres, when he was still Minister of Infrastructure, hurried to join them with the idea, although most of the scientists studying the subject had reached the unequivocal conclusion that a connection with the Red Sea is particularly problematic as it might breach the delicate ecological balance on both sides of the canal.
Most references to Herzl?s romantic notion contain the sentence: ?Herzl was a lawyer by profession, not an engineer?. With all due respect to engineers, and there?s plenty of respect, you don?t have to be one to understand that when an idea starts to get complicated, it stops being smart. It?s not for anything that the genial ideas in history were first and foremost simple - from the invention of the wheel to the Internet. If there is a solution to the problem of the Dead Sea, it has to be simple, applicable, and not opposed to nature.
One such idea has been developed by the American architect Phu Hoang, who, in 2004, opened an office searching for architectural solutions to cultural, environmental and political problems. The New-York based office initiates research on its own, some of which starts off at studies in architecture schools.
33 year old Phu hasn?t built a lot. He worked as project manager at the Michael Hopkins Children Hospital in London, and then at Bernard Tshumi?s office in New-York, and teaching architecture studio with him at Colombia University. Today he teaches at other prestigious universities such as Yale, Pennsylvania, and Pratt, using the potential of the students as a lever to solving problematic issues.
In this context he investigated with his students at Pennsylvania University various solutions for saving the Dead Sea - an activity that developed into this proposal whose feasibility is worth examining.
The project, carrying the symbolic name ?No Man?s Land?, refers to the peninsula expanding as a malignant growth in the heart of the Dead Sea, between Israel and Jordan. Hoang?s idea is based on exploiting the huge blocks of salt to absorb water from the moist air by natural process. To finance the project, Hoang suggests building a series of floating isles connected by a system of paths, to form an attractive tourist resort.
The beauty of the project lies in its simplicity and the availability of its three components: moist air, salt blocks, and an emptying lake that would gladly absorb the water planned to unceasingly drip onto the sides of the structures, which were planned together with Cecil Belmond of the well-known engineering office ARUP.
And a word of summation: For the knowledge of all the woe wailers, PR people and PR recipients - the Dead Sea is not drying up on its own, but rather as result of the failing water policy of the State of Israel. The drying up of the Dead Sea, as the drying up of the Kinneret, is a direct consequence of limited thinking that still succumbs to the paradigm of the supremacy of science over nature.
Hoang?s idea - like many others unchecked - does in fact exploit the potential of science, but does not try to teach nature from whence pees the sea.
The seas canal project and intelligent alternatives One of the grandiose ideas Israel has ?amused? herself with over 60 years of existence is the Seas Canal Project to connect the Dead Sea with the Mediterranean: studying the subject a bit, checking out alternatives, listening for reactions - in Israel, the world, the neighbors - but never really daring to implement it. And not without good reason.
The plan to dig a canal between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea was conceived already in 1899 by Max Werkert - an engineer who proposed a course crossing the Yizrael Valley and Beit She?an to the Jordan River, curving, as the maps show, between the Kinneret and the Dead Sea. The idea was published two years later in Herzl?s book ?Altneuland?, as proof that the Jewish state to arise would have the necessary energy resources for its existence, with no dependence on the energy sources of a hostile surrounding.
In the search for energy sources, with the establishment of the state fifty years later, the idea again arose, but - with no chance of obtaining the required financing for the enormous undertaking - it has since remained a romantic dream. In 1977 when Israel realized she was about to lose the vast oil resources of the Sinai Peninsula, it was decided to check the feasibility of the canal project again, and this time rigorously. However, scientist Prof. Yuval Ne?eman, who was entrusted with studying the proposal, estimated the cost of the project at $1.5 billion, and advised against carrying it out for unforeseeable environmental ramifications.
Fortunately, the country?s leaders, accustomed to elections about every two years, refrain from entering into projects whose fruit will be picked by their successors, and the canal vision just continues to run around inside their heads, or more precisely - their consultants?, who occasionally pull it out of their hats like rabbits, especially for the media?s needs.
Precisely as expected, we have lately been informed that the President of the State, Shimon Peres, having consulted with the charming actor Leonardo de Caprio, decided to lift the gauntlet and to push for the project, in his manner - despite all the objectors. At the same time, so it is heard, businessman Yitzhak Tshuva has appropriated the ?original? idea as his own personal vision - which is quite worrisome, as the man, considered one of the richest in the world, has already realized a number of dreams in his life.
Building canals to improve the geographical reality is not a new phenomenon. The end of the 19th century saw many of them around the globe, the most well-known being the Suez Canal, completed in 1869, and through which 10% of the world?s ships sail; the Panama Canal, 1889, between the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic, saving ships 13,000 km and gleaning Panama 80% of its national income; and the Corinth Canal in the Peloponnesus. Though not free of inflicting damage upon their surroundings, these and their like save vast amounts of energy, and improve the quality of life of millions.
Contrary to these projects, which do not try too hard to mess with the Act of Creation, the Seas Canal Project diametrically opposes it. Just for comparison, the difference between the two oceans is less than twenty cm, while the level gap between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, which happens to lie at the lowest place on earth, is 420 m. (!!!). One can only guess at the consequences of flowing enormous quantities of salt water across the fertile soil, but from the little already researched it is clear that the action might end in an ecological disaster.
Moreover - there is no chance in the world that the project will deliver the goods, namely, to supply a profitable and enduring source of energy, while raising the level of the Dead Sea without harming its unique biological composition. It is already clear that the energy put into digging the canal and building the bridges to cross it will never be returned, if only for the fact that the small sea will quickly be filled up, and - with no water - the power turbines will have to cease operating.
From this point on the plan only gets more and more complicated in the search for solutions to the problems created as solutions to previous problems. Thus for instance, alternative lakes created for the superfluous sea water will not only saline the ground-water, but will ultimately get filled up as well, to which say the geniuses of the generation, who can?t solve the water problems of Israel - we?ll use the redundant water for desalination.
According to this Clochemerle logic, one might actually ask: why not desalinate sea water directly from the Mediterranean, to prevent overpumping of the Kinneret water, whose overflow is intended, according to God?s original plan, to balance out the amount of water of the Dead Sea? And if we?re already speaking of creating lakes, why not use them to contain the rain water flowing freely into the sea? The Nabateans already proved it works in 300 BC, and big time!
All this does not belittle the impending ecological disaster to the Dead Sea, even without this project. On the contrary, the phosphate plant which has abused as it wishes for years, the natural process of drying up, the ensuing vultures, and the receding water line harming the tourist value of a geographical resource, one of the most unique in the world - all these cry out to the skies - or waters. In the background stands, of course, the missed chance for co-operation with our neighbor to the east, Jordan, which had the idea in the 70s for a canal along the border with Israel, but ultimately understood that a 200 km. pipeline is better - again, without really understanding what the price can be. What?s embarrassing is that Peres, when he was still Minister of Infrastructure, hurried to join them with the idea, although most of the scientists studying the subject had reached the unequivocal conclusion that a connection with the Red Sea is particularly problematic as it might breach the delicate ecological balance on both sides of the canal.
Most references to Herzl?s romantic notion contain the sentence: ?Herzl was a lawyer by profession, not an engineer?. With all due respect to engineers, and there?s plenty of respect, you don?t have to be one to understand that when an idea starts to get complicated, it stops being smart. It?s not for anything that the genial ideas in history were first and foremost simple - from the invention of the wheel to the Internet. If there is a solution to the problem of the Dead Sea, it has to be simple, applicable, and not opposed to nature.
One such idea has been developed by the American architect Phu Hoang, who, in 2004, opened an office searching for architectural solutions to cultural, environmental and political problems. The New-York based office initiates research on its own, some of which starts off at studies in architecture schools.
33 year old Phu hasn?t built a lot. He worked as project manager at the Michael Hopkins Children Hospital in London, and then at Bernard Tshumi?s office in New-York, and teaching architecture studio with him at Colombia University. Today he teaches at other prestigious universities such as Yale, Pennsylvania, and Pratt, using the potential of the students as a lever to solving problematic issues.
In this context he investigated with his students at Pennsylvania University various solutions for saving the Dead Sea - an activity that developed into this proposal whose feasibility is worth examining.
The project, carrying the symbolic name ?No Man?s Land?, refers to the peninsula expanding as a malignant growth in the heart of the Dead Sea, between Israel and Jordan. Hoang?s idea is based on exploiting the huge blocks of salt to absorb water from the moist air by natural process. To finance the project, Hoang suggests building a series of floating isles connected by a system of paths, to form an attractive tourist resort.
The beauty of the project lies in its simplicity and the availability of its three components: moist air, salt blocks, and an emptying lake that would gladly absorb the water planned to unceasingly drip onto the sides of the structures, which were planned together with Cecil Belmond of the well-known engineering office ARUP.
And a word of summation: For the knowledge of all the woe wailers, PR people and PR recipients - the Dead Sea is not drying up on its own, but rather as result of the failing water policy of the State of Israel. The drying up of the Dead Sea, as the drying up of the Kinneret, is a direct consequence of limited thinking that still succumbs to the paradigm of the supremacy of science over nature.
Hoang?s idea - like many others unchecked - does in fact exploit the potential of science, but does not try to teach nature from whence pees the sea.
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