Chapter 3: Transforming the Earth
Chapter 3: Transforming the Earth
The end of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century was a period of great transformation. This saw the premiership of Natasha Tereshkova, one of the most popular Premiers in the history of the USSR’s history. People began to live on Mars for the very first time in human history. The worst environmental disasters began to be reversed and the Sahara was utterly transformed into a grassland. This was a period of boundless optimism before the great cataclysm of the 22nd century.
Election of Natasha Tereshkova
In 2080 Natasha Tereshkova would win her election and become the Premier of the Soviet Union. Her time in office would be remembered as a transformative time as humanity was brought together. She would become one of the most popular leaders of the Soviet Union. Under her leadership, exploration of Space would jump by leaps and bounds.
The Cosmonaut Premier
Natasha was born into a family of cosmonauts, her great grandmother, Valentina Tereshkova would be one of the first women in Space and she followed suit. She would visit the moon and even visit Mars. Advancements in rocketry had made it so that getting too and from the planets were becoming quicker. She would be the first of a new generation of Soviet Leaders and a sign of greater things to come.
Due to her background she was naturally a strong supporter of space travel and exploration. As Premier she would be the first person to visit the ISS in orbit and visit Mir. While her trips to both were not long, just a couple of days. It was evidence of just how far technology had come where going to the moon was now considered routine enough for a diplomatic visit.
A transformative Economy
Her big issue was the massive economic transformations that were undergoing under her administration. The economy was moving headlong into a purely green economy. Automation had begun to completely transform the economy. Day by day it looked like that Wage Slavery would be automated away.
The latest version of OGAS brought much economic prosperity to the country as the more centralized planning aspects of the economy were automated. Advancements in robotics allowed automation in many aspects of the economy. Luxury goods became more and more available for all people in the USSR. The quality of living conditions greatly improved because of these changes. 3d printing allowed many goods to be made in their own home. OGAS brought much wealth to the country.
This was also a transformative time due to the climate crisis and the advancement of Space industry. Because of the climate crisis facing the world, massive projects were needed across the world. From restoring the Aral sea to restoring the Rain forests of the Amazon to the plan to combat desertification across the world.
Then there was the Space industry. From the expanding Mir base on the moon to the settlement of Mars to the development of space mining. It was this industry that was growing in leaps in bounds. Moreover, this was just beginning as the 22nd century would prove. Every week it seemed like something new was going on with Space.
Space Exploration in the last decades of the 21st century
[settling mars in the second half of the 21st century]
The late 21st century and the first few decades of the 22nd century were a period of great technological innovation. It was here when major discoveries such as artificial gravity would be discovered. It was when people started to live in space. It was an era when people began to see that mining the asteroid belt would not only be possible but they figured out how.
Space Mining
Earth during the turn of the 22nd century was a period of great century. Especially as the 22nd century dawned, there was a desire to not only stop the disastrous effects of climate change but to reverse it. There was a demand for rare earth metals, especially as the nations on earth did not want to pollute the earth any more. For all these reasons and more Interkosmos began a program to do just that.
It was quickly decided that the Asteroid belt would be the safest option for doing this. Not only were the asteroids said to have the most rare earth minerals and metals needed, but it also didn’t endanger the plans for the moon settlements and Mars. Both of which were growing during this era.
Mining the Asteroid belt was not without its risks. There was the difficulty that most asteroids were small and thus landing on them. Even the larger asteroids like Vesta and Juno were not the easiest thing to land on. The reason why space mining took till the 2070s and 2080s to take off was because before the rockets were not just powerful enough at least when one factors in the costs for this to be a regular thing. Now however rockets were able to make such journeys easy.
New technologies for Space
While more powerful rockets made it quicker and cheaper to get to Mars and the asteroid belt, and even beyond it. The technology that made everyone interested was Artificial Gravity. While theories and ideas for getting artificial gravity had existed and been worked on for decades. Concepts involving spinning were in the past, the most common solution to the problem but ran into issues involving the amount of energy needed as well as the Coriolis force.
It was in the 2070s and 2080s that true artificial gravity would be possible for spaceships. In 2082, Marika Kaminski would publish her findings of a way to generate artificial gravity. To simplify her research, generating artificial gravity would require generating graviton particles, then by manipulating the gravitons and running an electric current through them one would be able to create a field of artificial gravity.
Now while kaminski deserves all the credit for her discovery, like many scientists this was built on the research of others who had been looking into the subject; including notably the discovery in the 2053 that Gravitons were a real thing and not just a hypothetical concept. No matter what though, Kaminski’s discovery revolutionized Space exploration.
It was in this era when the first non-earth food would be grown and developed. While there had been some experiments which proved that things could be grown in space or on the moon, in 2068 people managed to grow the first actual vegetables on the ISS. This would lead many botanists to explore what others could grow in space. Most of these crops were nutritious but not really that flavorful. Still it allowed for crops to grow on the moon and the ISS.
Life in Space
Living on Mars would be the main focus of this era. Mars was a difficult place to live in. What with the near lack of atmosphere, meteor showers, Dust storms, no living food, radiation from the sun and more. Still living on Mars had long been a dream of humanity and while mankind in the past had set foot and did scientific experiments, they would eventually return to earth. It was in this era that humanity first decided to stay there for life.
Habitats on Mars would be generally be built using domes made of various materials including aerogels. A mixture of solar power, wind power, and fusion would provide the power needed. Most of these communities were about scientific experiments of various types.
On June 18th 2087 Dimitri Fyodorov would become the first person to be born on Mars, the very first Martian. This was not planned but the Soviet government did want to know how growing up on Mars would cause someone to develop. One thing that became apparent was that due to the general gravity of Mars, Dimitri and other Martians that would be born on Mars tended to be taller than people back on earth.
The International Expands
The last decade of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century would see great change for the 4th International. Three treaties would transform the International as a meeting between the leaders of the International to a governmental body. Everyone knew it wouldn’t be done in their life time but what was decided would change the International and laid the foundation for a united World.
The Treaty of Berlin
On May 1st 2073 the treaty of Berlin would be signed by all members. This treaty would begin a process of transforming the International into an actual government. Before the treaty the fourth International was more of a meeting place for the various leaders of the 4th International.
The Treaty of Berlin would begin to establish a government instead of just a meeting between the various communist countries. It would create a court of justice for the whole International. It also created the Supreme Soviet of the International and the International Presidium.
The Presidium was made up of the leaders from each member nation and in effect operated as a head of state. While the Supreme Soviet of the International, often just called the International Soviet to not be confused with the Soviet Union’s Supreme Soviet, was the legislative branch of the International.
There were two aspects of the Treaty of Berlin however that were heavily criticized and divided people within in the countries of the Fourth International. The first was the replacement of the various individual currencies with a single International currency and that all members would have an open borders with one another.
The Treaty of Shanghai
The treaty of Shanghai was signed on August 24th 2094 that established both a single currency and a central bank to regulate it and control it. The single currency, called the Sovznak was to be the unified currency. As most of the world had moved to a digital for their own currencies.
Sovznak was originally a currency from the early 20th century during the New Economic Policy years. The name is an abbreviation of the expression Sovetskiye znaki, or in Russian Советские знаки, which translates to Soviet Token. The name of the currency was revived for the unified world currency that the Treaty established.
The Treaty of Leningrad
The treaty of Leningrad in October 25th 2116 brought about the ending of borders among the members of the 4th International. It also created a common passport for all members of the International, though passports of the various member countries would work during the transition as the old passports were phased out.
Of the three treaties this was the one that brought the most backlash from the more nationalistic, and xenophobic members of the various nations. The KGB and other various related organizations would use their might against these groups. Which was not without controversy but it did effectively neutralize opposition to the treaty.
The International was committed to equality for all the whole world. When they sang the International they sang the refrain of ‘The Internationale, Unites the human race’. This was a phrase that they were not going to let some backward reactionaries destroy.
Saving the Planet
Of all the crises that were facing the world at the end of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century, the climate crisis was one of them. While work had been done throughout the 21st century to avoid the absolute worst catastrophe, that was not much of a blessing for the world. There had been increasingly stronger hurricanes and floods, worse heat waves, and more.
There would be work done to combat it. It was this action more than any other that brought the world boundless hope before the events of the 22nd century. For they would do what their fathers and grandfathers had long thought were impossible, they had reversed climate change and saved the world.
Aral Sea Restoration Project
[the restored Aral Sea]
In the 20th century and early 21st century the Aral Sea went from a sea into a desert known as the Aralkum desert.This was the earliest project undertaken to reverse an environmental disaster. One of the Soviets own making; which also explains why the campaign to reverse it took on a tone of atonement for the USSR’s past actions.
Even though by the time that the Project began things had been looking better since the bleak years of the 2000s and 2010s. Due to the fact of a shifting economy and moving away from such heavy production of cotton in the Kazakh SSR. It also helped that improved irrigation and farming techniques allowed the region to grow crops without being so damaging
The project to restore the Aral Sea required pumping water into the basin again. The rivers and dams that had been built in the early 21st century for irrigation which helped a bit though was not perfect. The devastation that had been done to the sea was that great. More water would need to be pumped in. That is where the second step of the project came in.
The second step would be to build canals so that water from the Volga and Ob-Irtysh rivers could be brought to the Aral Sea. This plan was a surprisingly old plan, but politics kept it from being implemented. This plan was not without its critics, from those who were concerned that this would disrupt more ecosystems in the way to the fact that this was an expensive project to undertake. Still the plan was given the go ahead
The effects of the plan took time yet by 2065, people around the world could bask in the fact that the Sea had been restored to what it was like in the 1960s. Fish were imported to return to the sea. The success of the project began a period throughout the world of not just stopping the effects of climate change and environmental disasters but reversing them.
Restoring America’s Beauty and Bounty
Due to the Second American Civil War, the environment was beyond devastated. During the war few of the factions cared all that much for the environment. From the Mississippi to the Hudson to the Colorado, rivers were drying up and filled with pollution. The Kingdom of God did as much damage as they could to the great plains in their death throes. The Great Plains had been transformed into a desert. Then add to the fact that even 50 years later, there were still no go areas scattered throughout the USSA where mines, and unexploded artillery could be found.
For the International restoring America’s beauty and her bounty was a high priority. The Great Plains were once one of the breadbaskets of the world and they would be again. The Great Rivers were vital to this as were the great lakes. A lot of this built on the back of the work down in reforestation projects in Central Africa and Brazil, and the Aral Sea Restoration project.
Of the various parts of the American Restoration project, restoring the Great Plains was a high priority. The plan here called for utilizing solar panels and wind turbines to reverse the desertification process. Studies have shown that large wind and solar farms can change local climate. That’s because wind turbine blades pull warm air from higher altitudes down to the earth’s surface. Dark solar panels, meanwhile, absorb solar energy so less of it is reflected back into space, also effectively increasing air temperature near the ground.
The restoration of America would take decades to complete. By the 2118 there had been much progress. The Mississippi had been cleaned up and restored, more impressively the Colorado river had been restored, and the Hoover dam had been not just fixed but modernized(like many landmarks it had been damaged during the civil war). The success of restoring the great plains and the west from a vast desert back to the plains and grassland it once was, gave confidence to an even more ambitious project.
Project Green Sahara
The most ambitious project of the first half of the 22nd century was to end the desertification that had long been going on. While the Great Green wall had been done to stop the desertification, Project Green Sahara was to go much further. It would reverse it and make the Sahara green for the first time in roughly 4,500 years.
This project called for several major steps. The Project called for the Sahara to be filled with Solar panels and wind turbines. This was done not just to take advantage of the region to provide power for the various countries throughout the Sahara but as a way to slowly reverse the desertification process.
This would increase the average local temperature by about 5 degrees Fahrenheit. The warmer temperature would lead to more rainfall, particularly in the Sahel. This enhances plant growth, which further increases rain. The simulation showed that the wind and solar farms more than doubled the average rain across the entire Sahara from 0.24 mm per day to 0.59 mm per day.
This provided clean energy for a good portion of the world. It provided clean energy for desalination and provision of water for cities and food production.The region which turned the Sahara into a grassland and savanna similar to the rest of Africa. It allowed food to be brought to countless people across the world.
The end of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century was a period of great transformation. This saw the premiership of Natasha Tereshkova, one of the most popular Premiers in the history of the USSR’s history. People began to live on Mars for the very first time in human history. The worst environmental disasters began to be reversed and the Sahara was utterly transformed into a grassland. This was a period of boundless optimism before the great cataclysm of the 22nd century.
Election of Natasha Tereshkova
In 2080 Natasha Tereshkova would win her election and become the Premier of the Soviet Union. Her time in office would be remembered as a transformative time as humanity was brought together. She would become one of the most popular leaders of the Soviet Union. Under her leadership, exploration of Space would jump by leaps and bounds.
The Cosmonaut Premier
Natasha was born into a family of cosmonauts, her great grandmother, Valentina Tereshkova would be one of the first women in Space and she followed suit. She would visit the moon and even visit Mars. Advancements in rocketry had made it so that getting too and from the planets were becoming quicker. She would be the first of a new generation of Soviet Leaders and a sign of greater things to come.
Due to her background she was naturally a strong supporter of space travel and exploration. As Premier she would be the first person to visit the ISS in orbit and visit Mir. While her trips to both were not long, just a couple of days. It was evidence of just how far technology had come where going to the moon was now considered routine enough for a diplomatic visit.
A transformative Economy
Her big issue was the massive economic transformations that were undergoing under her administration. The economy was moving headlong into a purely green economy. Automation had begun to completely transform the economy. Day by day it looked like that Wage Slavery would be automated away.
The latest version of OGAS brought much economic prosperity to the country as the more centralized planning aspects of the economy were automated. Advancements in robotics allowed automation in many aspects of the economy. Luxury goods became more and more available for all people in the USSR. The quality of living conditions greatly improved because of these changes. 3d printing allowed many goods to be made in their own home. OGAS brought much wealth to the country.
This was also a transformative time due to the climate crisis and the advancement of Space industry. Because of the climate crisis facing the world, massive projects were needed across the world. From restoring the Aral sea to restoring the Rain forests of the Amazon to the plan to combat desertification across the world.
Then there was the Space industry. From the expanding Mir base on the moon to the settlement of Mars to the development of space mining. It was this industry that was growing in leaps in bounds. Moreover, this was just beginning as the 22nd century would prove. Every week it seemed like something new was going on with Space.
Space Exploration in the last decades of the 21st century
[settling mars in the second half of the 21st century]
The late 21st century and the first few decades of the 22nd century were a period of great technological innovation. It was here when major discoveries such as artificial gravity would be discovered. It was when people started to live in space. It was an era when people began to see that mining the asteroid belt would not only be possible but they figured out how.
Space Mining
Earth during the turn of the 22nd century was a period of great century. Especially as the 22nd century dawned, there was a desire to not only stop the disastrous effects of climate change but to reverse it. There was a demand for rare earth metals, especially as the nations on earth did not want to pollute the earth any more. For all these reasons and more Interkosmos began a program to do just that.
It was quickly decided that the Asteroid belt would be the safest option for doing this. Not only were the asteroids said to have the most rare earth minerals and metals needed, but it also didn’t endanger the plans for the moon settlements and Mars. Both of which were growing during this era.
Mining the Asteroid belt was not without its risks. There was the difficulty that most asteroids were small and thus landing on them. Even the larger asteroids like Vesta and Juno were not the easiest thing to land on. The reason why space mining took till the 2070s and 2080s to take off was because before the rockets were not just powerful enough at least when one factors in the costs for this to be a regular thing. Now however rockets were able to make such journeys easy.
New technologies for Space
While more powerful rockets made it quicker and cheaper to get to Mars and the asteroid belt, and even beyond it. The technology that made everyone interested was Artificial Gravity. While theories and ideas for getting artificial gravity had existed and been worked on for decades. Concepts involving spinning were in the past, the most common solution to the problem but ran into issues involving the amount of energy needed as well as the Coriolis force.
It was in the 2070s and 2080s that true artificial gravity would be possible for spaceships. In 2082, Marika Kaminski would publish her findings of a way to generate artificial gravity. To simplify her research, generating artificial gravity would require generating graviton particles, then by manipulating the gravitons and running an electric current through them one would be able to create a field of artificial gravity.
Now while kaminski deserves all the credit for her discovery, like many scientists this was built on the research of others who had been looking into the subject; including notably the discovery in the 2053 that Gravitons were a real thing and not just a hypothetical concept. No matter what though, Kaminski’s discovery revolutionized Space exploration.
It was in this era when the first non-earth food would be grown and developed. While there had been some experiments which proved that things could be grown in space or on the moon, in 2068 people managed to grow the first actual vegetables on the ISS. This would lead many botanists to explore what others could grow in space. Most of these crops were nutritious but not really that flavorful. Still it allowed for crops to grow on the moon and the ISS.
Life in Space
Living on Mars would be the main focus of this era. Mars was a difficult place to live in. What with the near lack of atmosphere, meteor showers, Dust storms, no living food, radiation from the sun and more. Still living on Mars had long been a dream of humanity and while mankind in the past had set foot and did scientific experiments, they would eventually return to earth. It was in this era that humanity first decided to stay there for life.
Habitats on Mars would be generally be built using domes made of various materials including aerogels. A mixture of solar power, wind power, and fusion would provide the power needed. Most of these communities were about scientific experiments of various types.
On June 18th 2087 Dimitri Fyodorov would become the first person to be born on Mars, the very first Martian. This was not planned but the Soviet government did want to know how growing up on Mars would cause someone to develop. One thing that became apparent was that due to the general gravity of Mars, Dimitri and other Martians that would be born on Mars tended to be taller than people back on earth.
The International Expands
The last decade of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century would see great change for the 4th International. Three treaties would transform the International as a meeting between the leaders of the International to a governmental body. Everyone knew it wouldn’t be done in their life time but what was decided would change the International and laid the foundation for a united World.
The Treaty of Berlin
On May 1st 2073 the treaty of Berlin would be signed by all members. This treaty would begin a process of transforming the International into an actual government. Before the treaty the fourth International was more of a meeting place for the various leaders of the 4th International.
The Treaty of Berlin would begin to establish a government instead of just a meeting between the various communist countries. It would create a court of justice for the whole International. It also created the Supreme Soviet of the International and the International Presidium.
The Presidium was made up of the leaders from each member nation and in effect operated as a head of state. While the Supreme Soviet of the International, often just called the International Soviet to not be confused with the Soviet Union’s Supreme Soviet, was the legislative branch of the International.
There were two aspects of the Treaty of Berlin however that were heavily criticized and divided people within in the countries of the Fourth International. The first was the replacement of the various individual currencies with a single International currency and that all members would have an open borders with one another.
The Treaty of Shanghai
The treaty of Shanghai was signed on August 24th 2094 that established both a single currency and a central bank to regulate it and control it. The single currency, called the Sovznak was to be the unified currency. As most of the world had moved to a digital for their own currencies.
Sovznak was originally a currency from the early 20th century during the New Economic Policy years. The name is an abbreviation of the expression Sovetskiye znaki, or in Russian Советские знаки, which translates to Soviet Token. The name of the currency was revived for the unified world currency that the Treaty established.
The Treaty of Leningrad
The treaty of Leningrad in October 25th 2116 brought about the ending of borders among the members of the 4th International. It also created a common passport for all members of the International, though passports of the various member countries would work during the transition as the old passports were phased out.
Of the three treaties this was the one that brought the most backlash from the more nationalistic, and xenophobic members of the various nations. The KGB and other various related organizations would use their might against these groups. Which was not without controversy but it did effectively neutralize opposition to the treaty.
The International was committed to equality for all the whole world. When they sang the International they sang the refrain of ‘The Internationale, Unites the human race’. This was a phrase that they were not going to let some backward reactionaries destroy.
Saving the Planet
Of all the crises that were facing the world at the end of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd century, the climate crisis was one of them. While work had been done throughout the 21st century to avoid the absolute worst catastrophe, that was not much of a blessing for the world. There had been increasingly stronger hurricanes and floods, worse heat waves, and more.
There would be work done to combat it. It was this action more than any other that brought the world boundless hope before the events of the 22nd century. For they would do what their fathers and grandfathers had long thought were impossible, they had reversed climate change and saved the world.
Aral Sea Restoration Project
[the restored Aral Sea]
In the 20th century and early 21st century the Aral Sea went from a sea into a desert known as the Aralkum desert.This was the earliest project undertaken to reverse an environmental disaster. One of the Soviets own making; which also explains why the campaign to reverse it took on a tone of atonement for the USSR’s past actions.
Even though by the time that the Project began things had been looking better since the bleak years of the 2000s and 2010s. Due to the fact of a shifting economy and moving away from such heavy production of cotton in the Kazakh SSR. It also helped that improved irrigation and farming techniques allowed the region to grow crops without being so damaging
The project to restore the Aral Sea required pumping water into the basin again. The rivers and dams that had been built in the early 21st century for irrigation which helped a bit though was not perfect. The devastation that had been done to the sea was that great. More water would need to be pumped in. That is where the second step of the project came in.
The second step would be to build canals so that water from the Volga and Ob-Irtysh rivers could be brought to the Aral Sea. This plan was a surprisingly old plan, but politics kept it from being implemented. This plan was not without its critics, from those who were concerned that this would disrupt more ecosystems in the way to the fact that this was an expensive project to undertake. Still the plan was given the go ahead
The effects of the plan took time yet by 2065, people around the world could bask in the fact that the Sea had been restored to what it was like in the 1960s. Fish were imported to return to the sea. The success of the project began a period throughout the world of not just stopping the effects of climate change and environmental disasters but reversing them.
Restoring America’s Beauty and Bounty
Due to the Second American Civil War, the environment was beyond devastated. During the war few of the factions cared all that much for the environment. From the Mississippi to the Hudson to the Colorado, rivers were drying up and filled with pollution. The Kingdom of God did as much damage as they could to the great plains in their death throes. The Great Plains had been transformed into a desert. Then add to the fact that even 50 years later, there were still no go areas scattered throughout the USSA where mines, and unexploded artillery could be found.
For the International restoring America’s beauty and her bounty was a high priority. The Great Plains were once one of the breadbaskets of the world and they would be again. The Great Rivers were vital to this as were the great lakes. A lot of this built on the back of the work down in reforestation projects in Central Africa and Brazil, and the Aral Sea Restoration project.
Of the various parts of the American Restoration project, restoring the Great Plains was a high priority. The plan here called for utilizing solar panels and wind turbines to reverse the desertification process. Studies have shown that large wind and solar farms can change local climate. That’s because wind turbine blades pull warm air from higher altitudes down to the earth’s surface. Dark solar panels, meanwhile, absorb solar energy so less of it is reflected back into space, also effectively increasing air temperature near the ground.
The restoration of America would take decades to complete. By the 2118 there had been much progress. The Mississippi had been cleaned up and restored, more impressively the Colorado river had been restored, and the Hoover dam had been not just fixed but modernized(like many landmarks it had been damaged during the civil war). The success of restoring the great plains and the west from a vast desert back to the plains and grassland it once was, gave confidence to an even more ambitious project.
Project Green Sahara
The most ambitious project of the first half of the 22nd century was to end the desertification that had long been going on. While the Great Green wall had been done to stop the desertification, Project Green Sahara was to go much further. It would reverse it and make the Sahara green for the first time in roughly 4,500 years.
This project called for several major steps. The Project called for the Sahara to be filled with Solar panels and wind turbines. This was done not just to take advantage of the region to provide power for the various countries throughout the Sahara but as a way to slowly reverse the desertification process.
This would increase the average local temperature by about 5 degrees Fahrenheit. The warmer temperature would lead to more rainfall, particularly in the Sahel. This enhances plant growth, which further increases rain. The simulation showed that the wind and solar farms more than doubled the average rain across the entire Sahara from 0.24 mm per day to 0.59 mm per day.
This provided clean energy for a good portion of the world. It provided clean energy for desalination and provision of water for cities and food production.The region which turned the Sahara into a grassland and savanna similar to the rest of Africa. It allowed food to be brought to countless people across the world.
