Stryder shared this link with us about the Svalbard global seed bank.
Countries from all over the world are sending seeds representing their native flora, to be stored permanently on an arctic archipelago, 1120 kilometers from the north pole. And guess what? They have refrigeration units to cool the vault, aiming for 0 degree temperatures designed to keep the seeds viable for 1000 years.
The remote location was chosen for security as well as its low temperatures.
The vault is being constructed 393 feet in a sandstone mountain under yards of reinforced concrete and blast-proof doors.
The mission, under the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources on Food and Agriculture is to store as many types of seed as possible, to prevent domestic and wild plants from becoming extinct in the event of a disaster like nuclear or biological warfare, global warming, plant epidemics or a meteor strike the like of which made the dinosaurs extinct.
The Gates foundation has given $30 million to this effort.
Moral of the story: If you believe global disaster is looming, move to Norway.
I came across and interesting idea. Future news. Here is my attempt:
China shocks the world by revealing the first completely pollution free coal fired power plants are supplying energy to the Olympics. Every gram of carbon the plants produced is trapped and recycled.
In further news it is announced that you may save the environment by getting drunk. Distilled spirits manufacturers finally realized that they could trap and recycle CO2 produced by sour mash fermentation by adding just a little extra plumbing.
And finally, one of the largest sources of waste paper was eliminated as phone books the world over went on an "opt in" system. After it was realized that many people who communicate via cell phone and internet never even open a phone book, it was easy to cut the number of phone books produced in the world by 90%.
Posted by: poetryman69 | December 16, 2007 at 07:23 PM