Earth’s Black Box: 10-metre-long steel monolith to be built in Tasmania this YEAR and filled with hard drives documenting our actions against climate change as an ‘unbiased account of the events that led to the demise of the planet’
If humanity is wiped out by climate change, how will we even know it has happened?
That’s the question being answered by Australian scientists, who are building Earth’s Black Box – a 10-metre-long steel monolith that records data about our planet.
It will be filled with hard drives that continuously document climate change and provide an “unbiased account of the events” that led to the Earth’s demise.
In the event of a climate apocalypse, it will provide a document of how humanity failed to prevent the disaster – as long as there is something or someone around that can access it.
Artist impressions suggest it will have a similar look to the mysterious monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s science fiction film ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’.
Earth’s Black Box will be built later this year at “an extremely geologically stable location” in Tasmania. In the photo you can see a realistic representation of what it will look like
Earth’s Black Box has a similar atmosphere to the black monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 epic ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ (pictured). The mysterious object arrives on Earth, causing confusion among startled primates
The ambitious project is led by Australian marketing agency Clemenger BBDO in collaboration with the University of Tasmania.
Sonia von Bibra, national head of production at Clemenger BBDO and president of Earth’s Black Box, said construction will begin and end in 2024.
“Although it has not been built yet, we expect to complete it this year,” she told MailOnline.
Earth’s Black Box was originally announced in December 2021 with construction set to begin the following year, but the project has been delayed.
Vov Bibra said “philanthropic donors” are “ready” with money to kick-start construction, but are waiting for an application to be approved by the Australian Taxation Office.
Although the exact location of the coffin has not been specified, it is said to be about a four-hour drive from the city of Hobart, somewhere close to the west coast, between Strahan and Queenstown.
Artist’s renderings suggest that Earth’s Black Box will have a similar vibe to the black monolith in ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’,
Although it will not be black in color, the Experts see it as an aviation black box, recording an aircraft’s performance and condition to provide vital information in case of accidents.
The top of the box connects to solar panels, providing it with a power source as long as the sun shines.
The Solar energy will enable the download of scientific data including sea levels and temperatures, ocean acidification, CO2 in the atmosphere, species extinctions and land use changes in different locations around the world.
Meanwhile, an algorithm pulls climate change-related material from the internet, such as headlines and social media posts.
Earth’s Black Box is a project led by marketing agency Clemenger BBDO and the University of Tasmania. It is depicted here in an artist’s impression
Earth’s Black Box is a project led by marketing agency Clemenger BBDO in collaboration with the University of Tasmania
The exact location of the coffin has not been specified, but it is said to be about a four-hour drive from the city of Hobart, somewhere close to the west coast, between Strahan and Queenstown.
According to the project websiteThe device’s purpose “is to provide an unbiased account of the events that led to the demise of the planet, to hold accountable future generations and to inspire urgent action.”
However, they’re still figuring out how anyone could access the data after a catastrophic climate apocalypse — or whether there would be people alive to do so.
It is possible that a small group of humanity’s survivors could learn more about the fall of civilization due to catastrophic fires, floods and drought.
Alternatively, it could teach aliens from distant planets what happens to species on Earth, in case they one day reach our planet.
Anyone who encounters it will need to have the “ability to understand and interpret basic symbolism,” the developers shared ABC in 2021.
Earth’s Black Box should have enough capacity to store data for the next 30 to 50 years, which is a key period in our quest to contain climate change.
Once active, the Black Box will record both forward and backward – in other words, acquiring data dating back months before it was turned on.
An electronic reader could potentially reactivate the box if it has entered a prolonged dormant state due to a catastrophe, such as a ‘Mad Max’ type post-apocalyptic situation.
The ‘Mad Max’ films are set in a post-apocalyptic desert wasteland where gasoline and water are scarce commodities (pictured)
Until a climate catastrophe actually occurs, it will certainly become a tourist attraction for rural Tasmania.
However, scientists routinely predict that some deadly climate event could occur within the next 100 years if humanity fails to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
Rising temperatures, dwindling food supplies and biodiversity loss due to climate change could lead to a global system collapse.
A study last year warned that humanity is in a ‘code red’ as climate change shatters countless temperature records.
Earth also exceeded the ‘doomed’ global warming limit of 2.7°F for the first time in 2023, which scientists said was the hottest in 100,000 years