Future Proofing in the Arctic.

Hidden away on a remote island in the Arctic Ocean is the “Doomsday” Vault.  It has the capacity to store 4.5 million seed samples from all regions of the planet.  Its purpose is to safeguard the world’s agriculture from future catastrophes, such as nuclear war, asteroid impact, climate change, natural disasters, poor agricultural management and disease etc.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is located on the Norwegian Island of Spitsbergen which forms part of the Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic Ocean.  It is approximately 1120km (700 miles) from the North Pole.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault acts as a backup to the worlds seed banks should seed reserves in these locations be lost.

There are five reason why this location was chosen:

1. Built within a region that has relative security, political and social stability.
2. Isolated from the rest of the world in a region where Permafrost will provide stable storage conditions for seeds.  With also little risk of local seed dispersion.
3. The Vault is about built 130 metres above sea level and is high enough to secure the facility against any rise in sea level as a result of global warming.  It has been built 120 metres into the side of a mountain, in a stable sandstone situation.
4. There is very little tectonic activity on the island which ensures long term structural stability of the vault itself and also the mountain in which it is built.
5. Access to the island is fairly easy considering its remoteness as it is built near the town of Longyearbyen and directly opposite Longyear Airport.  The vault can be quickly accessed from the town and ensures security can be maintained.

The seeds are stored at minus 18 degrees Celsius and placed in sealed packages that again will be placed in sealed boxes that will be stored on high shelves inside the vault. The low temperature and the limited access to oxygen will ensure low metabolic activity and cause a delay in the aging of the seeds. The permafrost will still ensure the continued viability of the seeds if the electricity supply should fail.

The facility consists of three separate underground chambers. Each chamber has the capacity to store 1,5 million different seed samples. With the aid of its own electric machinery, powered by electricity from the local power station, it will maintain a constant interior temperature of minus 18 degrees Celsius. The chambers will have storage shelving for prepacked examples of food seeds from the depositors (donor countries).

The storage chambers themselves are reached via an access tunnel about 100 metres long, with an entrance portal on its outside. The entrance portal will be the only visible part of the facility. It is in the form of a long, narrow concrete “fin”, with an entrance of brushed steel. An artistic decoration on the outer roof surface and on the upper part of the front will partly reflect the polar light and partly give off a muted, glowing light. (Source: http://www.regjeringen.no/en/dep/lmd/campain/svalbard-global-seed-vault.html?id=462220)

I think this project is fantastic and is truly worth while.  If we want to safe guard our existence on this planet and combat poverty in developing nations then continued access to seeds is essential.  There is far too much emphasis placed on access to energy resources such as oil and coal, in my opinion maintaining our ability to access food is far more important.  And the fact that the Vault looks like the Rebel base in Empire Strikes Back makes it all the more worth while.  If your going to build a Seed Vault in the Arctic why not make is look cool as well.

Dolphin in the Brisbane River

This afternoon (Sat 06/09/2008) I was lucky enough to see a lone Dolphin in the Brisbane River.

We’d gone for a walk along the river at Orleigh Park Westend when we saw it breaking the surface.

We watched it for about 15 minutes as it swam up down the river occasionally spouting water through its blow hole and diving back under the water.

This is the first time I’d seen a Dolphin this far up the river, I have seen them previously in Moreton Bay and at the Sunshine Coast.

Here are a few pictures I managed to take:

Returning to Oludeniz

As mentioned in a previous post I have recently returned from Turkey after spending 5 days staying at my Dad’s place in Fethiye. The day I arrived I visited Oludeniz – the only place that really stood out in my mind from my last visit to Turkey when I was a child. I was sort of expecting it to be the same as it was 21 years ago. My Dad confirmed my memory that when we had first visited Oludeniz there were only a few wooden structures on the beach at the lagoon end of the bay and a boat mooring – very untouched. However, this was not what was presented to me upon my arrival this time. On the beach at the lagoon end of the bay is a sea of beach umbrellas, which in fact stretch quite along way along the beach. Also, back from the main beach is basically a town which has developed to cater for all the tourist which visit Oludeniz every summer. Hotels, shops, restaurants etc. (You can see how big the town is in picture_03 below) I was also interested to find out that Oludeniz has become one of the most popular paragliding places in the world, the evidence of this was by the fact that while I was there one landed on the beach every few minutes. Having said that Oludeniz and the surrounding area is still a beautiful place and well worth a visit. Oludeniz is however a victim of its own magnificence, there are still untouched places on this coastline like the Oludeniz of 21 years ago but they are few and usually only accessible by boat.

Uncontacted Amazonian Tribe.

I was amazed to see in the news this week pictures of a tribe in the Amazon that is yet to have any contact with the outside world. It is great that there are still places on this planet that are so remote and inaccessible that people can exist as they have done for hundreds of generations without any influence from the outside world. The lives these tribes people live are so far removed from anything any westernised person could comprehend. My belief is that now that we know these people exist, there should be no attempt to contact them and thus destroy their unique way of life. Survival International claim that there are still more than 100 uncontacted tribes in the world, most of which are in Peru and Brazil. We owe it to them and the rest of humanity to ensure that the areas these people live in are protected and that their untouched cultures are maintained.

Amazionian Tribal Warriors

Tribal members next to their hut

Tribal Settlement in the Forest

A clearing in the trees

Dwellings in the Forest

Acre State, Brazil

The Tribe was photographed in the Ethno-Environmental Protected Area along the Rio Envira in the Brazilian State of Acre.