The Qattara Depression Project is no Atlantropa, but it’s still pretty ambitious:
The depression is a region that lies below sea level and is currently a vast desert. By connecting the region and the Mediterranean Sea with tunnels and/or canals, water could be let into the area. The inflowing water would then evaporate quickly because of the desert climate. This way a continuous flow of water could be created if inflow and evaporation were balanced out. With this continuously flowing water hydroelectricity could be generated. Eventually this would result in a hypersaline lake or a salt pan as the water evaporates and leaves the salt it contains behind.
The proposals call for a large canal or tunnel being excavated of about 55 to 80 kilometres (34 to 50 mi) depending on the route chosen to the Mediterranean Sea to bring seawater into the area.
Or otherwise a 320 kilometre (200 mile) pipeline north-east to the freshwater Nile River at Rosetta.
For comparison, the nearby Suez Canal is currently 193 kilometres in length.
By balancing the inflow and evaporation the lake level can be held constant. Several proposed lake levels are -70, -60, -50 and -20 m.
Plans to use the Qattara Depression for the generation of electricity date back to 1912 from Berlin geographer Professor Penck.
In 1957 the American Central Intelligence Agency proposed to President Dwight Eisenhower that peace in the Middle East could be achieved by flooding the Qattara Depression. The resulting lagoon, according to the CIA, would have four benefits:
- It would be “spectacular and peaceful.”
- It would “materially alter the climate in adjacent areas.”
- It would “provide work during construction and living areas after completion for the Palestinian Arabs.”
- It would get Egyptian president Gamel Abdel Nasser’s “mind on other matters” because “he need[ed] some way to get off the Soviet Hook.”
(Hat tip to Scott Alexander.)
Not for the first time, I marvel at the combination of ambition, genius, and naïve idiocy that was the Dulles-era CIA.