Atlantropa: Water Management Needs Pragmatic Approaches and Out of the Box Acting!

Water challenges of today and the future include environmental changes, sharing of rivers and lakes among different stakeholders, challenges in cooperation and conflict from local to international scale, insufficient water quality in Africa and chemical micro pollutants in European drinking water.

Despite the severity of todays water challenges, we base our approaches largely on theoretical concepts, water diplomacy, peace talks, WASH seminars, and scientific studies. We develop great visions and excellent action lines. All good and necessary, but eventually only a small contribution of our human and financial resources to address current challenges effectively because it largely remains on paper. Very often we develop great concepts and visions without implementing them.

A very inspiring person who was both, visionary and pragmatic, is German architect Herman Sörgel (1885-1952). He put all his energy to implementing his vision of Atlantropa.

Atlantropa is based on geographical observations at the beginning of the 20th century, showing that the Mediterranean Sea was an evaporating sea. This fact led Sörgel to devise a scheme transforming the entire Mediterranean region.

The project included the construction of two dams. A 35-kilometre-long curved dam across the Straits of Gibraltar in order to shut off the inflow of water from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean. A second dam across the Dardanelles to cut off the water supply from the Black Sea. He envisaged a third dam – between Sicily and Tunis – which would effectively split the Mediterranean Sea in two. In Sörgel’s vision of Atlantropa, however, work on the third dam would not begin for another 100 to 200 years (see: http://www.deutsches-museum.de/en/research/projects/focal-point-i/cluster-1/).

Goals of Atlantropa were manifold. It should create new agricultural land, create employment, and provide energy for entire Europe. Moreover it should provide a good base for peace through collaboration among European and African populations.

The project was never implemented. Main obstacles were seen in various problems of environmental, political, and social sustainability. Sörgel was fighting for the project until he died in 1952. Final cut to the lifelong project of Sörgel was the rise of nuclear power which was seen at that time as sustainable approach to satisfy energy needs across Europe.

Despite the megalomaniac and utopist character of the Atlantropa project, Sörgel is giving a good example of a visionary, out of the box thinking, and persistent individual!

Lucas Beck, 6. Oct 2015

Read more:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantropa

http://www.deutsches-museum.de/en/research/projects/focal-point-i/cluster-1/

Taxonomy

• Pressure Managment
• Drinking Water Managment
• Dams