Conservation and Sustainable Use of the Biosphere - WBGU

210 F The biosphere in the Earth System
process. Individual advantages as a result of changed
environmental conditions seem only to be advantageous
in the long term if others to which there is a
relationship of dependency also benefit.The network
of interactions and linkages between the biosphere
and the environment is therefore important for
understanding the living conditions on Earth. How
did this system of coevolution of life and the planetary
environment develop? Answers to this key question
can probably only be given for artificial, reconstructed
‘worlds’ that as complete systems provide a
platform for this type of system analysis. Such systems
are intended to simulate BIOSPHERE I, ie the
ecosystem not yet disrupted by humankind.
F 1.2
A constructed environment: BIOSPHERE II
The idea of an artificial world created by man as a
closed and autonomous station that sustains itself
and provides all necessary resources for humankind
is not new. This vision is pictured in forms that range
from the Garden of Eden to Noah’s Ark through to
ideas of sustainable development that are meant to
enable the life (and survival) of man in a harmonious
relationship with creation. And in the search for survival
options on other planets, space travel has
planned concrete projects to this end. One of the best
known projects is BIOSPHERE II, an experiment that
emerged in the Arizonan desert. It was created as the
smallest possible biosphere that was self-regulating
and inhabitable by man. The system should be compact
enough to be managed, but sufficiently complex
and diverse to serve as a reasonable laboratory for
the investigation of natural ecosystems. Two main
goals were set: first of all, to investigate biogeochemical
cycles in closed systems that have a significant
influence as regulatory processes on the inhabitability
of a planet and secondly to gain a deeper understanding
of the possibility of human survival in permanent
balance with the biosphere (Kelly, 1994).
F 1.2.1
How much nature does a civilization need?
The most obvious, but probably most trivial strategy
for creating an artificial biosphere is to include a
miniature replica of each ecosystem and each climate
zone. The questions ‘How much nature is necessary
for survival?’ or ‘What kind of nature is necessary
from a human standpoint?’, if one could answer
them, would probably have led to a different construction
principle. For the design of BIOSPHERE II,
however, the global biosphere constituted the model
that one hoped to approximate as fully as possible.
On an area of 1.6 hectares, hermetically sealed, five
natural and two artificial habitats were created: tropical
rainforest, savannah, desert, swamp, sea, an area
with intensive agriculture and a living and working
area for eight inhabitants. Of course, in an experiment
of this sort not every detail can be incorporated.An
artificial geosphere is as impossible to realize
as would be glaciers or large ice-covered regions.
However, the endeavour was to come as close to the
model as possible. In the rainforest, for example, a
more than fifty meter high mountain was constructed
on which fog machines produced a realistic mist veil
and a river with a waterfall created the illusion of a
real tropical mountain forest.
F 1.2.2
Constructing balance and its limitations
Whereas on Earth (ie in BIOSPHERE I), climatic and
hydrological cycles were driven by the sun, these
environmental conditions could not be created in
BIOSPHERE II. A high degree of technical input with
cooling, heating and pumping systems was designed
to at least reproduce the most important aspects of
the environmental conditions on Earth. A salt water
sea with a volume of 250,000 litres, drainage systems,
additional water reservoirs and a host of sprinkler
systems and mist machines demonstrate what sort of
effort is required to ‘make weather’. One should not
forget that precipitation and temperature had to be
prepared for the various ecosystems.A large number
of monitoring and control systems were therefore
used to maintain all of the major environmental
parameters such as temperature, humidity, air and
water quality within the specific levels required. At
the same time, these devices also made it possible to
permanently store the environmental data. A ‘sniffer
system’ consisting of over 1,200 sensors took air and
water samples every 15 minutes. In that way all developments
could be reconstructed. They thought they
had thought of everything, but of course it turned out
differently. The good news was that the air quality
was better than in a space craft. The bad news was
that no one knows why. The assumption was an
unknown microbial mechanism. But that was not the
only unusual message. The carbon dioxide levels in
the air behaved completely erratically. The highest
concentrations recorded of up to 3,800ppm were not
threatening to the life of the inhabitants of BIOS-
PHERE II, in a submarine up to 8,000ppm is admissible,
but they were concerned about the so painstakingly
created coral reef since carbohydrate dissolved
in water breaks down lime as carbonic acid. The oxygen
concentration fell from 21 per cent to 15 per cent,