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Not all deserts are equal. The Sahara desert is truly immense -- 99.99% of it is not at risk of construction. And unless you are building on top of something

Not all deserts are equal. The Sahara desert is truly immense -- 99.99% of it is not at risk of construction. And unless you are building on top of something with a natural water source, you're probably not endangering any life; the parts without water sources are essentially lifeless. Frankly, after the initial setup, the shelter the panels provide will probably support more life than the open sand. Same as why environmentalists are ok sinking ships to provide a foundation for artificial reefs -- nature does not magically optimize for the most life-dense environment; it just is the way it is.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
Again, the attitude here is that species unique to the desert environment are worthless; that more familiar species that humans like have value; that somehow its better for every life form to have more shade and water and less sunlight. This is untrue for the desert environment. And hard for many people to comprehend. "More life" has never been the ecological impact metric. Why, a cattle feedlot has more life than the prairie that came before. And so on. The desert is by no means lifeless. Some 50 species of mammals, endless snakes and arachnids (scorpions etc), many species of grass and brush. Even in the relatively-less-inhabited sand dune 'oceans' there is life. But nobody is putting solar panels in the sand dunes. It will have to be on solid ground - rocky plateaus. Which are the most-populated of the Sahara environments.
- bpodgursky 11y ago
  You have to make relative impact judgement eventually. Pure relativism will just paralyze you. No reasonable person is going to think that replacing 1km^2 of the central Sahara is equivalent to bulldozing 1km^2 of the Amazon. "More life" might be simplistic, so call it more life*biodiversity for total impact or whatever you want. And in this specific example, the fact is that you are impacting almost no desert species in the dry parts of the Sahara. I suspect you are conflating low-moisture "deserts" like the Sonoran desert, where there is in fact life to impact: http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTQQZ0DZRlKp1Ht0B-4W44wuL5yThNZ8jzk1lDbzp4zahQJjG6Aqw http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTQQZ0DZRlKp1Ht0B-4W... with the central sahara: http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/09/550x366x152309-004-B86402CF.jpg.pagespeed.ic.7rrq8YOutu.webp http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/09/550x366x152309... Where no, there is really nothing to impact.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    Nobody is building anything on sand dunes. That's a straw man, right? Its the rocky places that have life, and are also useful for construction projects.
    - Retric 11y ago
      Huge chunks of the Sahara are man made. Protecting that is a really arbitrary choice. Your basically suggesting to protect the 'dust bowl' because you happen to be born after the disaster. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl
      - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
        The Sahara has been there for centuries now. Its not a local disturbed weather pattern by now. So as an ecological issue, its significant. It should be considered when proposing megaprojects that alter square miles of ground. Yet it hardly gets mentioned. I take this as evidence we are not serious about ecological impact issues.
        Retric 11y ago
        Sure, it's ~5-15,000 years old. The snowball started a feedback loop when people cut down local forests and over grazing killed off a lot of grass land. Altering local wind patterns etc. But, that's still an eye blink in terms of ecology.
Avshalom 11y ago
Immense and growing despite efforts to stop it. If there is one environment on the planet not in risk it's the Sahara. A lot of Egypt, Northern Africa, Iraq/Palestine would have looked like the American Midwest back when they were empires.
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  True its a man-made desert (despite some published nonsense about 'shifts in the earth's axis' causing weather changes). So are most of the ecosystems on the planet, by now. The issue is, changing relatively stable ecosystems is done at our peril. I just want to point out how little we really care about this stuff - to the point we enthusiastically endorse mega projects that amount to terraforming, with so little discussion.
Pxtl 11y ago
It is, however, important to make sure that this plant is not in any migratory paths of birds. The air above the centre of the plant will be hot enough to incinerate them (this has happened with these sorts of solar plants)
- upofadown 11y ago
  You are thinking about a different type of system I suspect. If anything the air would be cooler above a system of this sort as the heat is being carried away by pipes.
  - Pxtl 11y ago
    Ah, yes. After re-reading the article I can see that I misunderstood what kind of system they were building - I saw the arrays of mirrors and thought they were building one of these: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2965070/Solar-farm-sets-130-birds-FIRE-Extreme-glow-power-plant-ignites-creatures-mid-air-tests.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2965070/Solar...
  - jonwachob91 11y ago
    http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/188328-californias-new-solar-power-plant-is-actually-a-death-ray-thats-incinerating-birds-mid-flight http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/188328-californias-new-so... <--- Don't think too much about the numbers they report; reports have come out conflicting with original reports. The point is that CSP does kill off flocks of birds... The question is how many.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago

Again, the attitude here is that species unique to the desert environment are worthless; that more familiar species that humans like have value; that somehow its better for every life form to have more shade and water and less sunlight. This is untrue for the desert environment. And hard for many people to comprehend. "More life" has never been the ecological impact metric. Why, a cattle feedlot has more life than the prairie that came before. And so on. The desert is by no means lifeless. Some 50 species of mammals, endless snakes and arachnids (scorpions etc), many species of grass and brush. Even in the relatively-less-inhabited sand dune 'oceans' there is life. But nobody is putting solar panels in the sand dunes. It will have to be on solid ground - rocky plateaus. Which are the most-populated of the Sahara environments.

bpodgursky 11y ago
You have to make relative impact judgement eventually. Pure relativism will just paralyze you. No reasonable person is going to think that replacing 1km^2 of the central Sahara is equivalent to bulldozing 1km^2 of the Amazon. "More life" might be simplistic, so call it more life*biodiversity for total impact or whatever you want. And in this specific example, the fact is that you are impacting almost no desert species in the dry parts of the Sahara. I suspect you are conflating low-moisture "deserts" like the Sonoran desert, where there is in fact life to impact: http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTQQZ0DZRlKp1Ht0B-4W44wuL5yThNZ8jzk1lDbzp4zahQJjG6Aqw http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTQQZ0DZRlKp1Ht0B-4W... with the central sahara: http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/09/550x366x152309-004-B86402CF.jpg.pagespeed.ic.7rrq8YOutu.webp http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/09/550x366x152309... Where no, there is really nothing to impact.
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  Nobody is building anything on sand dunes. That's a straw man, right? Its the rocky places that have life, and are also useful for construction projects.
  - Retric 11y ago
    Huge chunks of the Sahara are man made. Protecting that is a really arbitrary choice. Your basically suggesting to protect the 'dust bowl' because you happen to be born after the disaster. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl
    - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
      The Sahara has been there for centuries now. Its not a local disturbed weather pattern by now. So as an ecological issue, its significant. It should be considered when proposing megaprojects that alter square miles of ground. Yet it hardly gets mentioned. I take this as evidence we are not serious about ecological impact issues.
      - Retric 11y ago
        Sure, it's ~5-15,000 years old. The snowball started a feedback loop when people cut down local forests and over grazing killed off a lot of grass land. Altering local wind patterns etc. But, that's still an eye blink in terms of ecology.

Avshalom 11y ago

Immense and growing despite efforts to stop it. If there is one environment on the planet not in risk it's the Sahara. A lot of Egypt, Northern Africa, Iraq/Palestine would have looked like the American Midwest back when they were empires.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
True its a man-made desert (despite some published nonsense about 'shifts in the earth's axis' causing weather changes). So are most of the ecosystems on the planet, by now. The issue is, changing relatively stable ecosystems is done at our peril. I just want to point out how little we really care about this stuff - to the point we enthusiastically endorse mega projects that amount to terraforming, with so little discussion.

Pxtl 11y ago

It is, however, important to make sure that this plant is not in any migratory paths of birds. The air above the centre of the plant will be hot enough to incinerate them (this has happened with these sorts of solar plants)

upofadown 11y ago
You are thinking about a different type of system I suspect. If anything the air would be cooler above a system of this sort as the heat is being carried away by pipes.
- Pxtl 11y ago
  Ah, yes. After re-reading the article I can see that I misunderstood what kind of system they were building - I saw the arrays of mirrors and thought they were building one of these: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2965070/Solar-farm-sets-130-birds-FIRE-Extreme-glow-power-plant-ignites-creatures-mid-air-tests.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2965070/Solar...
- jonwachob91 11y ago
  http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/188328-californias-new-solar-power-plant-is-actually-a-death-ray-thats-incinerating-birds-mid-flight http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/188328-californias-new-so... <--- Don't think too much about the numbers they report; reports have come out conflicting with original reports. The point is that CSP does kill off flocks of birds... The question is how many.