http://operationoasis.com

Operation OASIS

(Are we flushing our chances of recovery down the toilet?)

• For thousands of years humanity has farmed the land and failed to stop the onset of desertification due to poor soil and irrigation water management.

• Food and fuel prices are out of control as crops continue to fail and fossil fuels are being exhausted.

• Drought and famine are becoming acceptable failures and millions of people are again staring death in the face.

• Deserts are expanding and farmers are forced to migrate to cities; pollution is inevitable from our consume-and-dump-lifestyle.

• Unemployment is rising and economies are teetering on the brink of economic meltdown.

• Flash floods and forest fires are becoming all too familiar as uneven distribution of rainfall wreaks havoc. Erosion of top soil spills into rivers and pours into the ocean along with wastewater from our toilets.

• If business as usual continues unchecked and these trends continue, our very survival is threatened and we are destined to go the way of the dinosaurs!

U.N Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon We are running out of time! Davos, Switzerland, 28 January 2011 - Secretary-General's remarks to the World Economic Forum Session on Redefining Sustainable Development

For most of the last century, economic growth was fuelled by what seemed to be a certain truth: the abundance of natural resources. We mined our way to growth. We burned our way to prosperity. We believed in consumption without consequences. Those days are gone. In the 21st century, supplies are running short and the global thermostat is running high.  Climate change is also showing us that the old model is more than obsolete. It has rendered it extremely dangerous. Over time, that model is a recipe for national disaster. It is a global suicide pact. So what do we do in this current challenging situation? How do we create growth in a resource constrained environment? How do we lift people out of poverty while protecting the planet and ecosystems that support economic growth? How do we regain the balance? All of this requires rethinking.

Super Tankers to become the environment’s best allies

The Solution

Operation OASIS is a project that solves each of the above problems by taking the surplus treated wastewater from countries that produce excess to arid coastlines in returning supertankers as ballast. 1/3 of a tankers capacity is used to transport sea water as ballast in segregated ballast tanks, back to countries affected by desertification where it is discharged into distant coastal waters often introducing invasive species which destroy marine life and fish stocks.

Our proposal is to substitute sea water for treated wastewater, which will ultimately be used for restoring coastal forests and vegetation in arid coastal zones, to restore soils and increase rainfall, removing the wastewater that pollutes developed countries’ coastlines.

Are We All Doing our Business in line with natures plan?

Animals, through digesting seeds and depositing them in the soil, assist the natural regeneration of many tree and plant species. If we copy their example, our own manure and urine (Humanure) would return the water, nutrients and organic matter required to transform the arid sand and stones into rich, life-supporting, water-retaining soil, putting an end to marine pollution and building sustainable farming and forestry industries to provide employment that supplies food, fuel and energy for our expanding populations.

Operation OASIS approaches the desertification problem from the coastlines and focusses on restoring coastal forests to draw in moisture from the ocean by moving the thermal barrier inland to draw in further moisture and precipitation to support reforestation and agriculture. In addition we intend to use fog nets to recycle ocean borne fog, transpiration and evaporated irrigation water back to the soil, and for producing potable water. Everyone knows you can't make it rain in the desert but you can turn the desert into a rainforest!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11137903

http://www.fogquest.org/

 http://www.operationoasis.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=8&id=9&Itemid=80#9

More details:

The return ballast capacity of tankers is currently used for transporting billions of tonnes of sea water a year, which ultimately is discharged back into the ocean at great cost to the environment and to our fuel prices. Sterilisation of sea water ballast is a primary concern for the reduction in the introduction of invasive species. Sterilisation plants are being installed on VLCC's and ULCC's costing £billions to shipping,

http://www.frost.com/prod/servlet/market-insight-top.pag?docid=203055815

Together with running costs and delays caused by processing the sea water, this is a significant burden on bulk shipping, that adds to the cost of fuel and an unnecessary waste of resources.  

 A third of all land claimed by desert is an understatement of the severity of arable soil losses; even in East Anglia we can see this effect with prolonged droughts due to the removal of trees and hedgerows, intensive monoculture cash crops and farming's over reliance on chemical fertilizers.

The reason that water transportation to arid areas is not yet a major issue is that no one as yet is addressing this most fundamental requirement for sustaining life in arid coastal regions affected by an inherent and obvious lack of water! Israel, who currently lead the field of irrigation and desert reclamation have seriously depleted ground water and rivers in a bid to reforest arid land. Israel are also using waste water as are many other countries, including Egypt, Spain, Italy, Morocco, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Portugal etc. The main problem is that despite this, there is simply not enough indigenous irrigation and waste water to address the massive problems of drought and desertification.

 Reusing treated waste water in countries affected by desertification is in wide use, becoming more common and is proven to work well with soils devoid of organic material for both reforestation and agriculture.

http://www.operationoasis.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=4&id=147&Itemid=64

 We are proposing a pilot project in Andalucia Spain using towable flexible water barges to move waste water from source to reforest and restore the soil as a sustainable economical solution to increasing worthwhile employment in this region. The City of Santa Pola are behind the project and have already suggested suitable areas. History of desertification in the Mediterranean: http://www.operationoasis.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=4&id=158&Itemid=80

 Instead of depleting underground water supplies, our approach will help to restore already depleted and contaminated aquifers and drive out the saline water that has rendered vast areas of farmland infertile.

 Operation OASIS will make use of gully irrigation, which has been tried and tested over thousands of years and is ultimately the most cost-effective methodology for transporting many thousands of cubic meters of water to trees and crops. This is how nature moves water! Towable water bowsers and semi-permeable irrigation pipework (which resists blockage from algae) to reach areas beyond the gravity flow of irrigation water. Lagoons will also be established to provide low cost storage for water and to create new wildlife habitats. The project will introduce biosolids (solid waste from water treatment plants) to condition the soils to store water and prevent run-off.

Farming and Forestry

Agroforestry-based practices are by far the most productive and sustainable solution for shielding crops from the sun and providing fuel, timber, fruits, nuts and animal fodder. http://wbro.oxfordjournals.org/content/10/2/151.abstract

Our main concerns are restricting over-grazing by goats and cattle and providing an education resource for best practice soil management.

 By engaging and empowering local communities in the techniques required to succeed, Operation OASIS will be rolled out in many countries and this feasible approach will ultimately lead to a significant positive effect on local and global climate.

 We are fully aware of the failures as well as the successes with reforestation of arid land, particularly the low survival of trees in China. There is another Great wall of trees that is successful in Sub Sahara Africa. Here the Hadley Cell provides the precipitation essential for supporting their efforts. This system is supported by Dr Jibunoh and Fade Africa: http://www.operationoasis.com/index.php?limitstart=9 Who are fully supporting Operation OASIS.

 Our approach is different.

Humanity for thousands of years has been fighting a losing battle against the deserts. Irrigation channels can be seen in satellite images, etched in the sands around past civilization remnants. You cannot make it rain in the desert but you can convert the desert into rainforests!

The opposite effect is self-evident when the world’s mightiest rivers run dry! http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/photos/rivers-run-dry/#/freshwater-rivers-syr-darya-1_45431_600x450.jpg

The FREdome Visionary Trust, which supports and sponsors Operation OASIS is an NGO with a charitable constitution. Together we have put forward an application for funding from the E.U. Communications strand of the Life Plus Initiatives and have raised £250k matched funding led by Liverpool University. Seville Uni, City of Santa Pola, Green Europe and FREdome. Provided matched funding, Cranfield University, who are the leading soil experts in the UK have also joined our funding application as consultants.

 FREdome sponsors Operation OASIS because it is a beautiful common sense approach that encompasses the facts that rainforests need access to airborne moisture from the coastlines and that vegetation transforms carbon emissions and waste into food and fuel. These facts are as obvious, simple and fundamental to our very existence as the facts that we breathe oxygen, drink water, eat food and burn carbohydrates/hydrocarbons.

However, because humanity has lost sight of them, vast swathes of the globe have been desertified, photosynthesis no longer occurs on a sufficient scale, there is a build-up of carbon emissions, waste and a serious shortage of natural resources, now causing our primary industries to falter.

Operation OASIS will help restore the carbon, water and nutrient cycles. This restoration needs to be elevated to at least the same level as the mantras of cutting carbon emissions, carbon sequestration and solar/wind/wave power. We need to secure international funding to drive forward this crucial programme.

Oasis Website: http://operationoasis.com

FREdome Blog: http://fredome.wordpress.com/

Contact: Andrew K Fletcher Email: Andrew (AT) operationoasis.com Tel +44 1803524117

Office: Operation OASIS, 26 Berry Drive, Paignton, Devon, TQ3 3QW, U.K.