This article was taken from the March 2014 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
How do you cultivate in the scorching desert? Each of these circles in Al-Jawf, southeastern Libya, is a kilometre-wide irrigation field created by a centre pivot machine -- a 500-metre-wide rig which rotates around an area, watering it with sprinklers. "This approach helps to minimise water loss through evaporation," says Jorge Cortes, whose Spain-based company Traxco supplies the equipment. Each pool grows a different crop.
Centre-pivots are widely used in desert areas: the extent of the Libyan models is unique, though, as this picture taken last year by
Japan's Advanced Land Observation Satellite shows. Libya has no natural freshwater rivers or lakes, so the biggest water resources come from huge aquifers lying beneath the land's surface, with thousands of kilometres of pipeline drawing water
up to supply cities and irrigation fields.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
