Moving Freshwater South . . Decreases Migration North! by Johnnie Buttram
Please find below the
Semi-Finalist Evaluation
Judges'' comments
- This is about water transfer from north to south across America to bring water from Canada and the US to water-poor countries in Latin America. The goal would be to halt the flow of environmental refugees. It wouldn't work for a number of reasons: 1. The system would be incredibly expensive to build and to run (water is heavy and expensive to pump) 2. Getting all the players to agree to give up their water and/or to have the necessary infrastructure running across their land would be impossibly hard. 3. The negative environmental impacts of water transfer projects are well known - thinking about projects such as have been undertaken in China, and the Snowy Mountains scheme in Australia. Even if the project went ahead, would it really stop the flow of environmental refugees - it seems unlikely unless it was accompanied by an intensive economic development programs.
- It would be great if your pitch were a solution, not the problem. The Judges would love to see a cartoon drawing or some other visual of the conduits. Do they tear or rip? If they are on rail lines that are used occasionally, do they lie flat between the tracks? Can you suggest a case where this could work, at least spelling out the volume of water that is currently not needed in one place that could be transferred to another, describing the unused pipe and railway that connects those two places? Is the process a utility to utility partnership, a community to community partnership or a sovereign to sovereign partnership? Since the US is one of your prime targets, it would be neat if you referred back to the problem creation described in e.g. the book Cadillac Desert.
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