In the year 1871 the Russian scientist Demtschenko published his essay "On the Irrigation of the Aralo-Caspian Lowlands to Improve the Climate of the Adjacent Countries" at the publishing house of the Kaiserliche Hofbuchhandlung Schmitzdorff in St. Petersburg. In the centre of these visions was the landscape of Siberia and its mighty rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean. They should to be diverted to irrigate steppes and deserts like the rivers Amu Darya and Syr Darya, from these rivers water has been already excessively withdrawn in the 19th century to increase the cotton production. The Great War, which started in 1914, stopped these visions for some time. The dynasties of the Hohenzollern, Romanov, Ottoman and the Archhouse Hapsburg, which had brought so much suffering and death to mankind, imploded in the years 1917 and 1918. So times should be about to change with new visions. More and more water was taken from the rivers Amu Darya and Syr Darya, so that the Amu Darya finally silted up before it flows into the Aral Sea and the Syr Darya became salinated. The fourth largest inland lake in the world became deserted, an impressive warning that the global climate was out of balance. But mankind has learned nothing from these catastrophes. The damage to the global climate caused by wars and sports is evident, as it happen with the Winter Olympics at Beijing. The competition venues were built with know-how, mainly from Europe, ski slopes came from the Swiss Bernhard Russi, snowboarders hold their competitions in the halfpipe built by Albert Zehetner from Salzburg, the ski jump arena was built by the expertise of the German architect Renn, the artificial snow comes from snow cannons made in Tyrol, the ski lifts from Austria. The winter sports industry from the EU was exported to the People's Republic of China. Private and state capitalism impressively prove their practical worthlessness for climate protection. There is no second planet earth! 

Herbert Gantschacher is Director, Author and Producer