Green Sahara
by Les W Kuzyk
Copyright 2014 Les W Kuzyk
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Green Sahara
Vince sat back in the meeting room chair. “So we speak only to the Niger national scenario,” he said.
“Yes.”
“Any other side effects?” Here in Africa. Or god-forbid back home in Calgary.
“Oh yes,” Tamanna said. “The scariest thing is, we don’t know all the side effects. We know the ozone layer will take some beating. But politically, we use this project and any predicted side effects to negotiate.”
“What about the military?” Vince leaned forward. “Our Nissan got blasted by that Hellfire missile–say they start zapping at the balloons. Now that could affect our release.”
She glanced up from her visiscreen.
“You’re the engineer. You tell me.”
“Well, we’ve designed a mostly nocturnal release. Reduced night-time visibility keeps us hidden. No doubt they have night detection capabilities, but we count on our distribution–we have release points spread all over the Ayăr Mountains. For any military, I’d speculate a statistical nightmare.”
This contract was a poles-apart design project, nothing like the oilfield back in Alberta. His contingency plan could replace a fifty percent loss. The sulphur supply line had that restored in a week and same for any balloon damage.
He felt queasy. What if they took him out as a drone target? And just hearing his voice talk this way, full of fear yet excited. Like eco-blackmail strategy...
“Good.” She smiled. “They’ll worry about media too. Politics.”
“What about who’s financing? Can we talk about that?”
“Short answer, no.”
“So Tami, who is financing? I mean, so many payments are Asian. The Chinese have a high climate change risk index, and other countries bordering China too. India was high, Bangladesh the highest. So it fits.”
“Open trust fund. Any country, or individual for that matter, can make anonymous contribution. I tell you the truth, Vince. Any country can leverage any financing towards its own political agenda. Nobody knows who contributes, but everyone knows the outcome. One exception to that short answer; we can emphasize the budget size.” She beamed. “This project has no wealthy-nation-only restriction–a country like Bangladesh now has equal say.”
He nodded. He knew the cost was low, very low, from his sulphur tonnage calculations. He had liquid sulphur dioxide trucked in from local oilfields of Nigeria and balloons and helium shipped in from Asia didn’t add much price.
“And why did we pick my country again? Why Canada to deliver this message?” He knew, but he needed to hear it again. Out loud. He’d had so many wild thoughts circling around his head lately.
“Take it from a global business outlook. Say Her Excellency was choosing from the five northern countries claiming Arctic rights, as the polar ice recedes. Maybe take military into account, and say environmental record as well. Who dropped out of Kyoto?”
“Yeah, OK. You know North Americans are pretty attached to their lifestyle, carbon based or not.”
“Well, you know what you tell a child in a sweets shop. You can’t have it all.”
“I feel like a rat.” He had grown up in an Alberta oil town, played hockey as a kid and listened to his grandfather’s stories of pioneering. Everyone did better in Canada, that was always the story.
“Think of future generations.”
“Eco-terrorism, that’s what they’ll call this.”
“Your daughter.”
“Yeah ...”
“Ready?”
He didn’t answer.