Give Hydro-Engineering A Chance

As with all challenges faced by engineers, these days of record heat should help spur innovation.

The field of geo-engineering, especially because it involves lofty projects that wow visitors and investors alike, gets a lot of press these days. And, I will not belittle its usefulness.

However, the often neglected field of hydro-engineering holds a lot of promise as well as challenges that have yet to be met.

Water, although not the best heat exchanger (hardly anything beats Freon gas) is abundant cheap and safe. I think there is a lot of room for devising systems that combine water and air to cool large spaces effectively, efficiently and perhaps even more cost-effectively that is done nowadays.

In the same way that lakes and rivers help to temper environmental heat, water-based heat exchange technology could be used to boost existing climate control systems.

Another area where hydro-engineering could help improve quality of life on this planet would be through easily deployed light pipelines that would combine flood control with irrigation. It's a fortuitous coincidence and somewhat of an irony that flooded areas are often just a few hundred miles removed from drought-stricken regions.

Imagine if we could move water from the flood-prone Mississippi delta to the scorching Nevada desert, or from Monsoon drenched Bangladesh to the scorched Sahara desert. Water, young man!