Doomsday Seed Vault Design Unveiled

in2mind writes "The BBC News is reporting on the completion of a design for a 'doomsday' vault ... that will house seeds. All known varieties of food crops will be represented in the structure, which will be constructed by the Norwegian government. The vault aims to safeguard the world's agriculture from future catastrophes by building into the side of a mountain. On a remote island. Near the North pole. The Svalbard International Seed Vault will house the seed samples at a preservative -18C (0F), and could be used by post-apocalyptic people to feed a hungry planet."

Comments

How long will a post-apocalyptic population last

[Anonymous Coward]

...on seeds that are buried in a mountain on a remote island? Provided they can get there, how many big macs can they make from those seeds?

Oh Great.

[notnAP]

Now the aliens know where to aim their bunker buster lasers.

yeah.

[User 956]

The Svalbard International Seed Vault will house the seed samples will at a preservative -18C (0F), and could be used by post-apocalyptic people to feed a hungry planet.

I don't think Unicron likes seeds.

Here's a sci-fi plot

[oskard]

Scientists go to the North Pole to build a Doomsday Vault, only to find such a vault is already there.

o_O

It would make a good movie.

[khasim]

Ocean voyage. Fighting off post-apocalyptic pirates to get to the seed storage site only to find that it's submerged and you have to fight mutant sea creatures to get inside so you can save your village with the last non-mutated vegetables in the world.

Kind of like a cross between "The Postman" and "Waterworld".

Okay, I lied about the "good" part. :)

Post-Apocalyptic Giant Mutant Birds Say THANK YOU!

[schwaang]

Now they'll have something to eat besides all the cockroaches.

or book, or game...

[spun]

Nah, it could be a good movie, or a good video game, or paper RPG module, or book for that matter. I had the same exact thought, "Whoah, that would make a cool story!"

Imagine, it starts out in some desolate village, with people scraping by on a few mutant crops and canned goods. Every year, the situation becomes a little more desperate as the crops produce few viable seeds and the canned goods are running out. Our intrepid hero (probably a moon-headed youth out exploring some old ruins instead of working) finds a fragment of an ancient magazine mentioning the seed-vault. He has some difficulty convincing his elders to invest any of the villages precious food-stuffs in his hair-brained scheme, but then the village seed stocks are plundered by raiders, leaving no choice. Of course, the raiders find out about the seed-vault and thus become recurring bad-guys throughout the rest of the story.

The journey to the seed-vault would be fraught with danger. Mutants, savages, the ever-present raiders, hot-zones and weather run amok all dog our heros on their journey. I say heros, because of course we need a team. There has to be the strong and capable ranger-type who doesn't quite trust the kid; the plucky heroine, tomboyish until she lets her hair down and we discover just how beautiful she is; the kid's geeky friend who knows how to fix things; the brawny muscle-type with a secret heart of gold who sacrifices himself when all seems lost, and the sneaky one who turns out to be a traitor like we always suspected he would.

When they finally get there, they discover... well, it could go lots of ways here. I'll leave it up to the imagination.

Sneaky Norwegians...

[bagsc]

1) Build Post-Apocalyptic Seed Bank for $5 million
2) Cause Apocalypse
3) Profit!!