The Outrageous Scheme to Capture and Sell Greenland’s Meltwater

Fresh h2o is becoming progressively scarce successful galore countries, but not successful Greenland. Its crystal expanse contains around 6.5 percent of the world’s caller water, and implicit 350 trillion liters are estimated to tally into the water annually. And with clime alteration accelerating Arctic melting, much and much of Greenland’s h2o is acceptable to travel disconnected the land each year.

In immoderate places facing h2o shortages, those precise aforesaid h2o molecules are perchance being taken from the oversea and turned backmost into caller h2o utilizing desalination, astatine ample electrical and fiscal cost. This has inspired a startup to prosecute an antithetic and ambitious concern task that has been partially approved by the Greenland government—harvesting glacier meltwater and shipping it abroad.

“We person 1 of the world’s finest resources successful this country and plentifulness of it, and we privation to propulsion that connection retired to investors and imaginable markets,” says Naaja H. Nathanielsen, Greenland’s curate for concern and trade.

The startup down the idea, Arctic Water Bank, plans to physique a dam successful South Greenland, seizure meltwater, and past transport it astir the satellite by vessel successful bulk h2o carriers. If each goes according to plan, the institution says the task volition beryllium wholly carbon-neutral and inflict minimal harm to the section environment.

“This is immoderate of the cleanest h2o successful the world. Anyone who has tried Greenlandic h2o knows that it’s pure, achromatic gold,” says Samir Ben Tabib, cofounder and caput of planetary relations astatine the startup.

Arctic Water Bank is archetypal and foremost, Ben Tabib stresses, a business, but helium believes it could besides supply a work to Greenlanders and the wider world. He argues that his institution volition assistance the radical of Greenland by leveraging the country’s earthy resources and paying taxes connected income generated from them, and it’s an ambition the authorities shares. “The extremity is twofold,” says Nathanielsen. “It is astir caller sources of income for the nationalist treasury, and section concern improvement and the associated instauration of jobs.”

In the agelong run, Ben Tabib says, Arctic Water Bank mightiness adjacent assistance mitigate the impending planetary h2o crisis. “It’s astir apt not thing our small concern tin lick alone, but successful Greenland, caller h2o is simply a assets that is conscionable washing into the sea.”

Right now, the startup has the archetypal permissions it needs. In documents seen by WIRED, the authorities grants the institution sole rights for the adjacent 20 years to usage each h2o and crystal from a stream adjacent the municipality of Narsaq. On average, this stream produces 21.3 cardinal liters of h2o each year, astir wholly meltwater from the Greenland crystal sheet. But earlier immoderate h2o tin beryllium shipped, a dam indispensable beryllium built, and Arctic Water Bank volition request an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) to beryllium completed to get started connected construction.

This isn’t arsenic large a hurdle arsenic it mightiness seem. Greenland whitethorn beryllium 1 of the astir untouched environments successful the world—roughly the size of Western Europe and location to less than 60,000 people—but the operation of dams is not unheard of, says Karl Zinglersen, caput of the Department of Environment and Minerals astatine the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources. In the aboriginal 1990s, the archetypal hydroelectric dam was built to service the superior of Nuuk, and since then, a fistful of smaller hydroelectric dams person been built astir the country. The EIA process is precise thorough, says Zingerlsen, but successful his acquisition it seldom if ever stops a project.