July/August 1984 RAIN Page 5 The first step would be to create salt marshes in low- lying valleys. To do so we would install New Alchemy sail-wing windmills to pump sea water into low-lying coastal valleys. The sea water would flow by gravity back to the sea, the windmills providing a technological analogue of tidal action. The newly created salt marshes would then be planted with a variety of organisms and seeded with marine creatures collected from relic Mediterranean marshes. At this juncture ecologically based mariculture could be undertaken to provide the restoration process with an economic base. As the salt marsh becomes established, the plan would be to plant brackish-water-tolerant plants, including the commercially important carob tree, around the edges. Many of these salt-tolerant plants would serve as an ecological beachhead for less tolerant plants on adjacent ground above. As the salt marshes start to act as catch basins for seasonal rains, this process will speed up. The marsh would begin to host a wide diversity of life forms, moving outward from the center, which in turn could trigger a more ecologically complex restoration cycle. The marsh complex would have the additional benefit of enhancing nearby marine life by acting as a nursery for many organisms that spend much of their adult lives in the sea. We have mapped out a further restorative strategy that is more technological and would be particularly applicable to arid or impoverished areas. Bioshelters would be constructed for distilling sea water with the long-range intention of nurturing young forests. The bioshelters would be approximately fifty feet in diameter and use New Alchemy's pillow dome structure. About a dozen would be pitched in a circle, like an Indian encampment. Inside the central zone of each structure would be the transluyent solar tanks or solar-algae ponds to grow fish and to heat and cool buildings. There is a chance that the ancient ecology lives on—in bits and pieces in various parts of the world—where it is available to be reassembled. During the day, relatively cool sea water would be pumped into them. The temperature differential between the water in the ponds and the air would be enough to cause the tanks to sweat fresh water down their sides onto the ground. At night the air would lose its heat to the atmosphere and the moisture-laden air within would condense on the inside of the bioshelter skin and "rain" down onto the ground inside the periphery of the building. Trees and other plants would be planted in the wet zones created by the "weeping" of the bioshelter. Once their roots were established and compost-rich soils created, the protective embryo of the bioshelter could be lifted off and taken to a new site to repeat the process, leaving behind the newly liberated ecosystem. Hardy trees could be planted adjacent to this nucleus to further diversify the restoration process. Each bioshelter rtilght be in place for two or three years before being moved to the next locale. There are many possible variations on the salt marsh and bioshelter schemes and a number of intermediate approaches. Taken together, they add up to an assembly of biotechnologies which can serve the restoration process—early catalysts in the coevolutionary process of planetary Cathedral bioshelter, St. John the Divine (FROM: Bioshelters, Ocean Arks, City Farming) Cathedral as Bioshelter .... The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, the largest Gothic structure in the world, has enfolded ecology into its expansive program. The Cathedral is rivaled in size and splendor only by the breadth of the rnission that has been forged for it by a succession of farsighted men. Under the present leadership of the Right Reverend Paul Moore, Bishop of New York, and the Very Reverend James Paul Morton, the Dean of the Cathedral, St. John the Divine is pursuing a course that honors the tradition inherent to its history and its architecture. In its time, the medieval cathedral was the center of its community, administering to all aspects of human life. Quoting Dean Morton, "Education, healing, the guilds, the arts, the market were all tied to the Cathedral. It was the symbol of the perfection of urban life." Accordingly, at St. John the Divine the arts, crafts, world peace, social justice, and ecological concerns are all part of the fabric of Cathedral life. The Cathedral has in residence its own drama, dance, and music groups, and is, in addition, frequent host to performances by innumerable other groups, from the internationally known to the dedicated amateur. These people use the church as much more than space—they are invited to make a contribution to a community integrating the sacred and secular.
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