Re: Mother nature

Doug Jones (random@qnet.com)
Thu, 16 Sep 1999 13:29:39 -0700

David Lubkin wrote:
>
> Come on, folks. This is a crowd that casually discusses melting
> planets over school vacation and who will bring the dip to a
> party 10 billion years from now. Rise to the challenge.
>
> Hal has suggested a strategy for gradual weather modification.
> Can anyone add some numbers? How do you actually introduce the
> counter-air streams?

There was a science fact article in Analog a coupla years back, in which it was suggested to build very tall "cooling towers" (~7000 m tall by 2000 m diameter) which would produce strong updrafts, including cloud formation and precipitation inside. The rain would be captured for potable water use, the winds tapped by turbines, and the sea surface for many km around cooled by evaporation, thus removing the power source for hurricanes.

These would have to be spaced on a 20 km grid on the water throughout the hurricane belt, but as a side benefit would produce great amounts of fresh water and electrical power (some of it by running the rain through hydro turbines- 3000 to 7000 meters of hydro head is not trifling).

And with elevators and a few diving boards, it would ba skydiving mecca... Just don't land too close to the base, or you'll get sucked in and passed through the meatgrinder. Hell on seabirds, too- you think the wind turbines in the Altamont pass kill a lot of birds, you ain't seen nothing...

Put a venturi in it and you have the ultimate skydiving wind tunnel as the wind howls upward at 60 m/s. Entry and exit without getting asphyxiated above or chopped up below is an exercise for the reader.

If the weather is very humid, you end up freefalling in the rain, though, and raindrops at that speed *hurt*. 

--
Doug Jones, Rocket Plumber
Frustrated grounded skydiver