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Assuming the plan to use nuclear energy to power large-scale desalination is at all feasible, the inputs are nuclear fuel and the sun, and perhaps some oil to p
by rhinoceraptor 4y ago
Assuming the plan to use nuclear energy to power large-scale desalination is at all feasible, the inputs are nuclear fuel and the sun, and perhaps some oil to power vehicles for livestock management.
It would also be a giant carbon sink, much better than any tree planting scheme could hope to be. The world's topsoil currently contains about 2500 GT of carbon, compared to 800 GT in the atmosphere [1].
Compared to plant agriculture, which requires a huge amount of natural gas for nitrogen fertilizer production, and just fertilizer production itself a pretty sizable contributor to both CO2 and non-CO2 GHG emissions. Not to mention pesticides, oil for farm equipment, etc.
1: https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/soil-carbon-storage-84223790/ https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/soil-carbo...
- eru 4y ago> Assuming the plan to use nuclear energy to power large-scale desalination is at all feasible, the inputs are nuclear fuel and the sun, and perhaps some oil to power vehicles for livestock management. You can use electric vehicles.. But if you are assuming plenty of cheap nuclear power, you can just synthesize all the hydrocarbons you'd normally need oil for straight out of thin air. Including all the hydrocarbons for conventional agriculture.