No. 2300 - Backup for Humanity

Appropriate for No 2300

Carved 390 ft (120 m) into a sandstone mountain in a Norwegian archipelago, the vault keeps the temperature of seeds well below freezing while also limiting humidity. This minimizes metabolic activity, which means that the seed vault will likely be able to preserve seeds for most major crops for thousands of years.

ALREADY HANDY ONCE

Despite remaining a pragmatic backup plan for the worst case global scenarios, the Doomsday Vault has already come in handy just a few years into its existence. In 2015, war-torn Syria was the first country to withdraw seeds from the vault in order to replace those lost in Aleppo due to the ongoing civil conflict.

The wheat, barley, and grass seeds from the Aleppo bank are thought to have important traits resistant to drought, which researchers think could be increasingly important in the face of climate change.

Something to think about... without question.