(CNN) 鈥� Ties van der Hoeven鈥檚 ambitions are nothing if not grand. The Dutch engineer wants to transform a huge stretch of inhospitable desert into green, fertile land teeming with wildlife.
His sights are set on Egypt鈥檚 Sinai Peninsula, an arid, triangle-shaped expanse that connects Africa with Asia. Thousands of years ago it was bursting with life, he said, but years of farming and other human activity have helped turn it into a barren desert.
Van der Hoeven is convinced he can bring it back to life.
He has spent years fine tuning an initiative aimed at restoring plant and animal life to roughly 13,500 square miles of the Sinai Peninsula, an area slightly bigger than the state of Maryland. The goal: to suck up planet-heating carbon dioxide, increase rainfall and bring food and jobs to local people.
He believes it is the answer to a slew of huge global problems. 鈥淲e are destroying our planet in a way which is scary,鈥� he told CNN. 鈥淭he only holistic way out of this situation is with large-scale ecological regeneration鈥�
So-called desert regreening projects are not new, and this is around the world seeking to transform arid landscapes. Many aim to halt desertification 鈥� the creeping degradation of dry lands 鈥� a phenomenon the United Nations calls a 鈥� that is destabilizing communities on a global scale.鈥�
But the concept is also controversial; critics say transforming deserts is unproven, enormously complex and could negatively affect water and weather in ways we cannot predict.
The birth of the plan
Van der Hoeven鈥檚 background may seem unlikely for someone intent on saving the world. As a hydraulic engineer at Belgian dredging company DEME, he worked on projects including building artificial islands in Dubai.
But in 2016, the course of his career changed when he was pulled into a venture to help the Egyptian government restore shrinking fish populations in Lake Bardawil, a saltwater lagoon in northern Sinai, separated from the Mediterranean by a narrow sandbar. It used to be more than 100 feet deep but is now less than 10 feet deep in parts, as well as hot and salty.
Within a few weeks, van der Hoeven devised a plan to open up the lagoon by creating tidal inlets and dredging 鈥渢idal gullies鈥� to get more seawater flowing through, making it deeper, cooler, less salty and more full of marine life.
But the more he researched, the bigger he wanted to go.
Scanning the terrain in Google Earth, he saw the outline of a network of now dried-up rivers, criss-crossing the Sinai like blood vessels, suggesting this land was once green. He pored over weather models and ecological studies and started to see connections.
He could use the sediments dredged from Lake Bardawil to help regreen the surrounding area. 鈥淭hey are salty but they hold very many nutrients and minerals, which you need to start restoring the land,鈥� he said.
He would start with the wetlands around the lake, expanding them to lure the birds and fish.
Then, he would go higher into the region鈥檚 mountains, pumping in the lake鈥檚 sediments and layering them to create soils where they could grow different varieties of salt-tolerant plants. These would help revitalize the soils, van der Hoeven said, reducing salt levels and making the land able to support a larger array of plants.
Van der Hoeven鈥檚 central idea is that adding vegetation to the landscape will mean more evaporation, more clouds forming and more rain falling. It could even change the winds, as greening the region can bring back moisture-laden flows of air, he said.
鈥淭his could completely change the weather patterns.鈥�
None of this will be quick.
Van der Hoeven estimates it will take five to seven years to fully revitalize the lake, then between 20 and 40 for the wider regreening.
鈥淚t鈥檚 really nature telling us the speed,鈥� he said.
Restoration 鈥榦n a planetary scale鈥�
Van der Hoeven鈥檚 idea might sound wildly ambitious, but it鈥檚 been done before.
As he was feverishly planning the Sinai project, he came across the film 鈥淕reen Gold,鈥� made by cameraman-turned-ecologist John Liu, which documents a huge desert regreening project in the Loess Plateau in northern China.
The region, nearly the , had been heavily degraded by years of overuse and overgrazing. With sparse vegetation and covered in thin, ocher-yellow soil, it was very prone to erosion.
In an attempt to transform the land, China鈥檚 government and the World Bank launched a in the 1990s, planting trees and shrubs and implementing grazing bans.
In the decades since, the Loess Plateau has flourished. Parts of the land are now carpeted in green, and less sediment flows into the region鈥檚 Yellow River, lowering the flood risks.
For van der Hoeven, it was further proof his plan could work.
He sought out Liu, who was immediately on board. The idea of regreening what was once a 鈥渓and of milk and honey鈥� was 鈥渆xtremely exciting,鈥� Liu told CNN. 鈥淭he scale reaches a level that helps prove that restoration can be done on a planetary scale.鈥�
It would add to other huge desert regreening projects also underway.
The in Africa, for example, was launched in 2007 to help combat desertification.
Originally intended to be a planted for thousands of miles across the continent鈥檚 Sahel region, the initiative has morphed into a 鈥渁 mosaic of green and productive landscapes鈥� over 11 countries, said Susan Gardner, director of the ecosystems division at the UN Environment Programme in Nairobi.
Restoration efforts are essential for tackling the climate crisis, nature loss and pollution, Gardner told CNN. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 have a choice. We have to do this; we have to listen to the science and act now.鈥�
A 鈥榝lashy distraction?鈥�
But ecosystems are incredibly complex and when it comes to huge, transformative projects like regreening a desert, some experts are concerned about unintended consequences.
In a project鈥檚 quest for a successful finish line, there is a risk that it will opt for fast-growing, non-native species which either don鈥檛 survive or become invasive, overtaking the surrounding native plants and damaging wildlife, said Alice Hughes, an assistant professor at Hong Kong University鈥檚 School of Biological Sciences. Others are water-thirsty, which can cause conflict with people鈥檚 needs.
During the early stages of Africa鈥檚 Great Green Wall project, many of the trees died for lack of water, neglect or because they weren鈥檛 suitable for the land.
Even in the Loess Plateau, widely credited as an astonishing success, there is evidence the vegetation may be approaching, or even exceeding, what the local water supply can support.
A 2020 of the region found that higher levels of evaporation from trees and plants had little impact in terms of increasing rainfall, and even led to 鈥渓ower water availability for agriculture or other human demands.鈥�
Changing the ecosystem could also mean 鈥減otentially changing climate patterns, which may reduce moisture and drive droughts elsewhere,鈥� Hughes said. Evaporation may cool one place but simply deposit the heat in other places.
Planting vegetation could even end up having a warming effect. Light-colored deserts can reflect more of the sun鈥檚 energy back into space than darker vegetation. 鈥淒eserts actually cool the planet,鈥� said Raymond Pierrehumbert, a physics professor at the University of Oxford.
While regreening arid places could bring local cooling effects, Pierrehumbert told CNN, they could end up 鈥渓eaving the rest of the planet worse off.鈥�
鈥淲e also need to ask ourselves why we are doing it,鈥� Hughes said. These projects can act as 鈥渇lashy distractions,鈥� she added. 鈥淭hey sound much more exciting than the basic work of protecting existing intact systems, which are still .鈥�
For Liu, however, there is a big difference between natural deserts and those humans helped create. The argument human-caused deserts should not be touched 鈥� even those that have been around for thousands of years 鈥� 鈥渄oes not seem logical to me,鈥� he said.
Van der Heoven readily admits the project is complex but believes it鈥檚 vital to try. 鈥淲e should protect nature with all we have, but we should also restore nature with all we have,鈥� he said.
He is studying exactly which plants will be able to attract wildlife and survive future climate change impacts. He also believes changing the climate in the Sinai Peninsula will have a positive ripple effect for the region.
Perhaps one of the biggest obstacles for now is regional instability as the war in Gaza continues.
At the end of 2022, the Egyptian government signed an agreement to start researching and planning the restoration of Lake Bardawil. The project was scheduled to kick off this December, but conflict has slowed everything down, van der Hoeven said.
He鈥檚 still confident it will happen and thinks the current situation 鈥渃reates an even stronger case鈥� for regreening as a way to help bring more opportunity and prosperity.
What is clear is that and , two interlinked global crises, are getting worse, and in the scramble to solve them, the idea of regreening arid land is gaining currency.
As with many compelling, moonshot ideas to tackle huge, complex problems, there are those who urge caution and warn of the dangerous consequences of rushing in,聽and there are those who argue the situation is now so urgent, there is no choice but to try them.
Van der Hoeven is firmly in the latter camp.
Regeneration of the natural world 鈥渋s the only way out of the mess we are currently in,鈥� he said. 鈥淭here is no time anymore not to act. We should act and accept that we don鈥檛 know everything.鈥�
The-CNN-Wire
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