HONORARY MENTION
The Rebirth of Karez: Oasis Plan By: Yuxuan Cai, Zehua Bian & Yuxuan Dai, China
The climate monitoring of the World Meteorological Organization shows that warming trend of the global climate system is further sustained. The global average temperature in 2018 is about one degree centigrade higher than pre-industrial levels, ranking the fourth since modern observation records are maintained. 2018 was the year with the highest ocean heat content on record. Sea levels continue to rise, and the sea ice range in the Antarctic and Arctic is far below average. Losses caused by global weather and climate disasters account for more than 90% of all the economic losses caused by natural disasters. In recent years, the number of Karez in Xinjiang, China began to decline sharply. We put forward a set of methods to solve the problem of Karez becoming dry gradually. In the 1950s, there were as many as 1,700 wells in Xinjiang. With the continuous drying up, by the end of the 1980s, the number of Karez wells had dropped to more than 860. Therefore, we hope to design a device to extract water from the air. The location of the device is in Turpan Basin, Xinjiang Province, China. The whole device consists of three parts:
First of all, in the middle of the unit, we use the large temperature difference between day and night in Turpan area, use MOF materials and wind power to condense water and supply it to underground rivers. Secondly, we simulate the special back shape of a desert beetle in Namibia and design a folding ground water replenisher at the top of the device, so as to realize water collection from the air in a sense. The water collecting principle of this desert beetle is that when the day and night alternate, the air will be filled with a lot of water vapor. The shape of the beetle’s back can leave the water vapor in the air to supplement the water needed by the body. The bottom of the device is composed of a group of supporting parts, which are used to fix the device on the well wall and play a supporting role. As a result, with the passage of time, the oasis in the desert will continue to recover without human interference. At the same time, we hope that this concept and model can be applied in other desertification areas, so that oases can reappear.