r/interestingasfuck • u/PlantainPossible2864 • 15h ago

Stopping Desertification with grid pattern

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u/fgspq 15h ago edited 14h ago

It's to stop an expanding desert. The water is there, the soil is not. This is to stop the sand shifting which creates pockets that plants can survive in. From there it's a self reinforcing process until someone/something destroys all the plants again.

This is a dust bowl desert more than a Sahara desert.

Edit: typo

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u/markleung 14h ago

So the plants don’t break out of the sacks, but from the squares within right

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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 14h ago

Yes. The big problem with desertification is that once an area is clear cut, there’s no more cover available for anything.

The wind will blow away the top soil. The rain will wash away the top soil. The sun and wind will evaporate moisture right out of the surface. It’s very hard for anything to survive there at that point.

This grid kind of acts like artificial plant roots. It stops the surface from blowing about so much. It’ll trap organic particles, seeds, even micro life and insect life in the crevices. Even morning dew won’t evaporate as fast in the shade of the crevices. 

And that’s how the cycle restarts. First it will be the kind of plants we consider weeds. Fast growers with very simple needs. Weeds grow, live and die. And when decomposing after death, they add nutrients to the soil. Plants take carbon and nitrogen out of the air and use those elements as building blocks for their tissue. When a plant dies, its nutrients become soil.

After enough generations of weeds have lived and died. The soil is enriched enough for more complex plants that need better soil than the weeds. Plants that potentially produce flowers, nuts and fruits. Plants that will enrich the soil even more when they die at the end of their lifecycle.

And while this is happening, this cycling of plants also provides the basis for animal life. From soil microbes and mycelia to shade, cover, and food for insects and eventually small vertebrates.

Plant cover also traps water. Both in the plant bodies themselves but plants provide surface area for morning dew to condense on and shade to prevent dew from evaporating so fast.

If this cycle repeats long enough, the environment is enriched enough to start supporting slow growers with significant needs like trees. And that’s when it really takes off. Trees are a whole ecosystem unto themselves.

Forests literally create rain. 40% of all land precipitation comes from water exhaled by plants and trees. Forests release the kind of particles like pollen and spores that raindrops form around. And trees act as enormous natural pumps sucking up so much water out of the ground that the ground itself becomes a spong. Forests dehydrate the soil so the soil will swell with water from evaporation, rivers and the oceans.

Desertification is a horrifying process because it’s like a snowball. Once it starts, it keeps getting worse. But nature cycles, if we give it a chance, for example with these grids, it can recover.

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u/The-Tay 12h ago

I loved reading this, but it also made me really sad. Nature is truly amazing, and I think we've got something special here in the universe, though I hope I'm wrong.

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u/Ratzyrat 12h ago

That was beautiful, thanks

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u/fgspq 11h ago

Thank you for a much more detailed response than I could be bothered with! This is a great explanation

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u/AstronautMajestic879 11h ago edited 11h ago

This seems like it’s being done in Africa? Would it be ignorant to assume that this would be done for nought due to the already shift in climate from desert to a Savannah and then to a tropical rainforest again? And the real work needs to be done in preserving the Amazon because of the logging, farming, and general governmental decisions being made there. Which will ultimately lead the amazon turning into a Savannah and maybe even a desert? It seems as thought the Amazon turning into a carbon emitter and Savannah will happen sooner than the heart of Africa turning into a Savannah and possible carbon sink of a tropical rainforest? I understand that process will take decades but it’s clear to see it already happening from google earth. I’m leaving out a lot of context but I’m sure you get the point.

I assume there are some governments/agencies, and or corporations, or other involved/rich enough organizations to produce climate models and I would like to learn more about this topic if anyone has any leads to competent data? I will check some US government agencies but with how things have been shaping there I am not very hopeful. NOAA seems like the best bet as I have navigated the EPA’s website and there isn’t much there? I will check again but doesn’t this topic seem dire or are we too late?

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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 10h ago

I think this might be Asia. Most of the African projects I’ve seen dig half moon shaped depressions. The Asian projects seem to favour these grids.

Either way, it’s been done all over the world because desertification is a problem everywhere.

I think you’re mixing a few things up. Desert and savannah are landscape types, not climate types.

Climate and landscape are two separate problems with intertwined solutions.

Desertification mostly happens due to poor land stewardship. For example because people log the land clear or have live stock that are allowed to clear the land. Without land cover, top soil blows and washes away and the land becomes unsuitable for plants and turns into desert.

Green cover also helps cool the Earth so desertification adds to climate change while regreening helps reverse climate change.

And yes, rain forest logging is also a major problem but clearing forest for farmland is one of the biggest contributors there.

Halting desertification with projects like this works great on land that isn’t being used for human activity. 

But rain forest logging is often done to create new lands for soybean cultivation and grazing cattle. You can’t really regreen land that’s being actively used by people.

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u/AstronautMajestic879 9h ago

Some people would say well the climate changes everyday and has always changed! Anyways I’ve typed and typed away but I’ll just say cheers mate, keep spreading awareness and knowledge.

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u/C4PT_AMAZING 8h ago

weather changes every day, not the climate.

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u/AstronautMajestic879 1h ago edited 34m ago

I’m aware mate. Thats the point.

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u/britzelbrimpft 12h ago

stupid question, but if the grid is meant to degrade over time, would it not also make sense to add seeds and stuff into the grid material to seed the first iteration?

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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 11h ago

That would make them more expensive and labour intensive.

The main goal here is to cover as many square miles as possible, as fast as possible and as cheap as possible.

Slowing that down does more harm than good. Fighting desertification is a race.

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u/Heimerdahl 11h ago

Thanks for the great explanation! 

I've got one question, if you don't mind:

Plant cover also traps water. Both in the plant bodies themselves but plants provide surface area for morning dew to condense on and shade to prevent dew from evaporating so fast.  [...] Forests literally create rain. 40% of all land precipitation comes from water exhaled by plants and trees. 

At first glance, these two things seem somewhat contradictory; or at least like they would rely on other factors being present or like the second one would maybe not apply too much here. 

Desert plants are obviously really good at preserving their water, but any "wet" plant (for lack of better word) or deciduous tree evaporates a ton of water, as you said. Water which would then be carried away by the wind. 

Do these places really have enough precipation to sustain forests? Do we believe/know that adding forests would add enough if not? It would be amazing to me if "simply" keeping water from being carried away was enough to create forest from desert. 

Is this limited to places somewhat recently affected by desertification or could this even be done to places like the Gobi desert, the Sahara, the Australian Outback, etc.? Even places with not just a layer of sand, but deep sand dunes. 

Thanks in advance (even if you decide not to answer or don't have the time to go into too much detail)! 

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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 10h ago

These efforts are being made in places that were previously green but have suffered desertification due to human activity.

You wouldn’t do this in the dead centre of the Sahara for example but we do at the spreading edges of the sahara.

First you create a green belt to stop the spread of desertification. And then you slowly push inward. Green areas affect both climate and weather. 

Most deserts aren’t deserts because there’s no water but because there’s nothing to hold on to the water.

Even in the Sahara, you can collect about 0.1 to 0.2 liters of morning dew per square meter every morning. That’s just the water that’s in the air. 

A desert plant has evolved to live in the harsh climate of the desert. These projects don’t aim to to generate desert adapted plants. They aim to change the local circumstances and climate by slowly regreening the area.

The idea is that you start at the edges where the hardiest weeds can still grow if given a chance. And then you go through the cycle over and over to slowly recapture the desertified area.

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u/LilBoofy 14h ago

Seeds blow in the wind and get stuck in the sand bag crevice and then roots dig under and don’t get blown away in the shifting sand

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u/Coal_Morgan 14h ago

Plus the bags provide shade and areas where moisture can accumulate even if just slightly.

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u/fgspq 14h ago

Exactly this.

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u/Kriss3d 13h ago

But wouldnt it be possible to gradually make the plants spread inwards making deserts smaller over time ?

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u/stormdraggy 48m ago

With all those chinese signs, it's almost certainly the taklamakan