[TacticalCoder]

The Mediterranean sea is, to me, the most beautiful place on earth. Be it mainland Spain (with, sadly, way too many concrete all along the coast), France, Italy, Croatia, Greece, ... It's just beautiful. Then the islands: Corsica, Sicily, Ibiza, Formentera, ... It's heaven on earth.

I drive my kid to school on the french riviera, along the coast and among the vineyards every day.

Famous poets and painters would go and settle there.

It requires a very special kind of a sad fuck to want to destroy that.

[bandibus]

Couldnt agree more. (I grew up in Cyprus.) From what I could tell, it didn't occur to Sörgel what effect the dams and evaporation would have on sea-life, and on the coastal economies depending on it. Probably catastrophic. But one thing that was encouraging about the Orkney turbine mentioned elsewhere in these comments: they ran a trial first, to see how wildlife would be affected. Result: negligible impact. So a modern-tech version that respects all that beauty does seem to be possible - if mining the raw materials required to build it is factored in, because that is a massive ongoing issue.

[tomrod]

I'm pretty sure he was a "change it all and we will make our own opportunity" type of dreamer, per the article.

[Dylan16807]

> It requires a very special kind of a sad fuck to want to destroy that.

On the other hand it's recreating a different entirely natural state the sea was once in, beautiful in its own way.

I'd still say it's wrong but I don't think it's a "special kind of sad fuck". The status quo is not king.

[zen_1]

Agreed, my childhood summers spent on the Egyptian North Coast/Sahel are some of my favorite memories.