[extropy-chat] Global warming news

[spike]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-
> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of "Hal Finney"
...
> 
> The only solution is to remove the CO2 from the atmosphere.  We have to
> develop the technologies to do this.  Now, I know Extropians will say
> that of course we will have these technologies within a few decades...Hal

Hal we already have the technology to do this.  We have had it for a long
time: dams and pipes.  Honestly, it really is this simple.  We have huge
grassy plains in the states, plenty of sufficiently deep fertile soil, doing
nothing currently, or almost nothing.  We have trees that can resist
disease, grow in shallow soil with few nutrients.  They just need lots of
water.  If we have the will, we can plant forests where now there is desert
or grasslands, divert the water inland that would otherwise be thrown into
the sea, a practice which so wasteful it should be illegal.

The Columbia and Sacramento Rivers should both be diverted to inland
forests, as the Colorado River is today.  The Mississippi, well that one
isn't easy, since the sources are lower in elevation, making them more
difficult to divert.  Eventually if we get clever, the Nile could be
diverted to make the Sahara a forest.

What am I missing here?  We can already control the amount of CO2 in the
atmosphere, yet I seldom hear anyone suggest converting it to standing wood.
Why?

spike