ABSTRACT

A method to control sea level rise comprises moving seawater from a sea (1) to an area of land. The seawater is desalinated before being placed in a natural depression (2) and pipelines are used to move the water. The water may be moved by gravity or pumped (4) and may be used to generate (3) electricity. Crops are also planted in an area near the natural depression (7) and irrigated by using the desalinated seawater that was pumped into this natural depression. In a specific embodiment the land used is the desert near the border of Libya and Egypt that contains the Qattara Depression (5).

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[001] This application claims priority to Provisional U.S. Patent Application Serial No. 63/071,441 filed August 28, 2020 (now pending), the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

[002] This invention relates to a method to manage sea level rise due to ice melt.

BACKGROUND

[003] According to a report published on January 25, 2021, entitled Climate Change: Global Sea Level by the U.S. National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, the global oceans are expected to rise by 1 - 1.5 meters by the year 2100 with an increase as high as 2.5 meters being plausible. This increase in sea level is due to a variety of conditions with melting glaciers caused by global warming, being the most prominent of those factors. If this worst-case scenario were to happen then Corpus Christi, Texas (2.1 meters above present-day sea level); Miami, Florida (1.9 meters above present-day sea level); and more than a dozen other cities would find themselves under water permanently.

[004] A variety of scientists and engineers have proposed diverting water from the Mediterranean Sea into the Qattara Depression in Egypt, with the French geographer Frangois Elie Roudaire being the first of one to do so in his article "An Algerian Inland Sea" that was published in the journal Nature in 1877. Jules Verne incorporated this idea, commonly referred to as the Qattara Depression Project, in his 1905 sciencefiction novel An Invasion of the Sea.

[005] Several individuals have proposed using the Qattara Depression Project to manage sea level rise due to ice melt. This includes Roger Arnold of the Silverthorne Institute in his article "Qattara Depression Project: Time to Revisit" that was published on August 10, 2016, as well as Mariam G. Salem in 2013's "Investigating the Filling Scenarios to Adapt to Climate Change" and Dominic S.F. Lee in his international patent WO 2009/123654 Al.

[006] In a paper entitled A New Perspective on an Old Idea: Re-Examining the Qattara Depression Project that was first published on May 9, 2020, the Inventor/Applicant contemplated a series of improvements upon the earlier iterations of this idea to increase the amount of sea level rise that could be managed. Those ideas were expressly incorporated in Provisional U.S. Patent Application Serial No. 63/071,441, which was filed by the same Inventor/Applicant. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

[007] This invention has embodiments that contemplate the concept of moving water from the oceans to be stored on land, so that water and ice that is currently frozen on top of land can enter existing ocean without the sea level rising.

[008] Water would be transferred from the Mediterranean Sea to the Qattara Depression in Egypt via a tunnel. Removing water from the Mediterranean Sean would offset rising the levels of the global oceans connected to it.

[009] The Qattara Depression in Egypt can hold 1,213 cubic kilometers or 291 cubic miles of seawater. This would mitigate a significant portion of the sea level rise caused by ice melt.

[010] As the depression fills with desalinated seawater, water could also be pumped from the depression and used to irrigate fields in the Old Delta Region, which is immediately south of the Qattara Depression. For best results, these fields should contain crops that use an intensive amount of water, such as cotton and sugarcane.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING

[Oil] The present invention will be readily appreciated from the following written description and from the drawing.

[012] Figure 1 is a schematic view illustrating the current invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[013] Turning now to Figure 1, the process starts with water flowing from the Mediterranean Sea (1) into an inlet where the process begins. This inlet should be located at a suitable location that east of Marsa Matruh and west of El Alamein in the Arab Republic of Egypt.

[014] The tunnel (4) would lead the seawater to a desalination facility and to a hydroelectric power generating facility (2 and 3).

[015] The tunnel (4) then transports the desalinated water to the Qattara Depression (5). Water could be moved either by gravity or with the aid of mechanical pumps.

[016] Water empties into the Qattara Depression (5), forming an artificial sea.

[017] As the Qattara Depression begins to fill, water is pumped from the depression (6) and used to irrigate crops that have been planted in the Old Delta region (7), which is located immediately south of the Qattara Depression.