Engineering Firm Plans To Tow Icebergs From Antarctica To Parched Dubai (stuff.co.nz)

A Dubai-based engineering firm is planning to tow an iceberg from Antarctica to help provide fresh drinking water to the desert city's rapidly-growing population. Stuff.co.nz reports: The National Advisor Bureau (NABL), a private engineering firm, wants to schlep a glacial iceberg from Antarctica -- weighing approximately 100 million tons -- to Dubai, via an intermediate stop in either Perth, Australia, or Cape Town, South Africa. If the iceberg doesn't melt along the way, the firm will sell the water to Dubai's government. Dubai, which is the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates, is growing so rapidly that a solution to the city's looming water crisis must be found, according to the city's largest English-language newspaper, The Khaleej Times.

The company is beginning a pilot study in November to examine the feasibility of the iceberg-towing project. According to Alshehi, the firm will use satellite imagery to look for a suitable iceberg -- which he says should be between 2000 feet (609 meters) and 7000 feet (2.1 kilometers) long -- and then try and tow it to either Australia or South Africa. Once the iceberg gets to its first stop, it will be towed the rest of the way. Because icebergs are so heavy, the company will need multiple ships to assist with towing, and it will use the ocean's prevailing currents to their advantage. Alshehi told NBC that even if 30 percent of the iceberg melts on the journey, it will still be able to provide between 100 million and 200 million cubic meters of fresh water -- enough for 1 million people to stay hydrated for five years. Last month, Alshehi told NBC: "If we succeed with this project, it could solve one of the world's biggest problems. So if we show this is viable, it could ultimately help not only the UAE, but all humanity."

Comments

Technically Illegal?

[Edis Krad]

The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty prohibits the exploitation of Antarctica's resources based on environmental concerns.

Now it does say -mineral- resources and I don't think ice counts as a mineral, but still, I'd imagine the environmental impact isn't negligible. Specially if done in large scale.

Re:Technically Illegal?

[thomst]

Edis Krad noted:

The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty prohibits the exploitation of Antarctica's resources based on environmental concerns.

Now it does say -mineral- resources and I don't think ice counts as a mineral, but still, I'd imagine the environmental impact isn't negligible. Specially if done in large scale.

Nope. Doesn't apply, even if you can twist the legal definition of "a mineral" to extend to ice.

(NB - the legal and scientific definitions of a term don't necessarily have the same definition, nor do courts typically allow themselves to be bound - or even influenced - by the scientific one, where legal precedent to the contrary exists, because, as Mr. Bumble opines in Oliver Twist, "the law is an ass.")

An iceberg, by definition, is not part of Antarctica in any way, shape, or form. It is, instead, its own entity - a chunk of ice floating in the ocean. As such, the protocol in question simply doesn't apply, just as it doesn't apply to, for instance, snow in the process of falling on the continent - because that snow is strictly an atmospheric phenomenon until it hits the ground, where it instantaneously transforms into a constituent part of Antarctica, and can then be considered a "resource".

Objects floating on the oceans are subject to international maritime law, but not to treaties regarding land-based mineral rights treaties, so it's salvage law that would apply - and anything afloat that's not actively crewed is fair game, where that's concerned.

I'm surprised I have to explain this ...

how much fuel

[supernova87a]

I would love to see the energy estimate for the fuel required to tow this, compared to desalination of the same volume of seawater, for example. A giant 30 story iceberg isn't exactly streamlined.

Re:Is this a good idea ?

[ShanghaiBill]

I mean .... is it ?

No. It is an idiotic idea. Most of the water in UAE is used for subsidized agriculture. Wheat (the local staple) does not naturally grow in deserts, so it needs lots and lots of expensive water.

Instead of importing millions of tons of water, they should be importing thousands of tons of wheat from countries with rain.

Re:Is this a good idea ?

[ShanghaiBill]

IF they're growing grain with it, that is.

Water use in UAE

From the citation: Irrigated agriculture is the primary water consumer, with an average of around 60% of total water use

Also from the citation: Irrigation water is generally used in a wasteful manner, mainly through traditional flooding and furrow irrigation techniques and for cultivating low-value, high-water-consumption crops.

Re:Is this a good idea ?

[kenh]

WTF are we talking about "greening the desert"? I mean, it's the desert - it wasn't a lush rainforest before the industrial revolution/age of the automobile, so why are we trying to make it something it never was? It's a stupid idea, it was always a stupid idea, and nothing Al Gore has ever has or will put on a powerpoint slide is going to change that.

Is desalination really so hard?

Can't Dubai figure out a way to, you know, conserve water?

Re:Is this a good idea ?

[rmdingler]

Unfortunately, it's done virtually everywhere.

Although California's almonds get a lot of the bad press, depleting the desert aquifers to grow hay and corn to feed slaughter cattle is similarly wasteful.

Re:STOP ME IF YOU HAVE HEARD THIS BEFORE!

[careysub]

Thanks for being at least one person who is not just opining in complete ignorance like all of other 126 posts here (at this moment).

This is subject (towing icebergs for water) has been studied to death, anyone can Google dozens of studies done over the last few decades. There is nothing novel about the idea at all. This is the second such scheme posted on /. this year!

Slashdot should stop posting stories about "plans" to do this, and just post a story about someone who is at least about to actually do it! But then there would be no story to run.

Re:Is this a good idea ?

[careysub]

True.

The worst travesty by far are the alfalfa growers in California, that only exist because of water rights written into law 140 years ago. The crop is worth less than the cost of delivering the water used to grow it, it consumes 22% of all of California's water (as much as all the cities in California combined) and 2/3 of the alfalfa is simply exported to Asia. Yes the California tax payer is paying to have 14% of the state's water exported to Asia at a financial loss so that a small number of industrial farm operators can pocket some money.

Just another fraud

[sjbe]

But history suggests this is mostly just another way of extracting money from gullible investors.

This. Towing icebergs around the globe is an old snake oil idea that someone dusts off every couple decades to try to sucker some "investors" out of some cash. It's an idiotic idea if you give it any real thought and have even a passing familiarity with physics and economics. It's like flying cars. It sounds like a cool idea and seems plausible enough at first to credulous people but the reality is that it isn't practical or economic and there are better solutions already available to us.

I am quite confident there are no actual plans to do this. It's just an old scam that I've seen several times already in my life and I'll probably see again a few more before I die.