The Netherlands is famous for being one of the flattest countries on earth
about half of the land of the entire country
is at or below 1 meter above sea level
and 25% percent of the countries land is at or even below sea level
this can be seen more obviously when you look at a relief map of the country like this one
Most of the land here in the north is flat
the land in the center has some low rolling hills
and the highest part of the country is here in the south
at just 322m above sea level
where the land rises slightly into the foot hills of the Ardennes mountains
So based on what i just told you
there is no such thing as a mountain in the Netherlands
we've constructed over 50 buildings that are
taller than the tallest point in the country.
but that hasn't stopped a few eccentric dutch from dreaming
it is been said that god may have created the world
but the Dutch created the Netherlands
building an entire mountain seems unrealistic until you consider what else the Dutch have already done
like their so far victorious centuries long war against the ocean
between 1200 and 1900 the Dutch people managed to reclaim 940 thousand acres of land
from the sea and an additional 345 thousand acres by draining their lakes
but the craziest thing they've probably done
was just last century when they transformed an entire ocean bay into
two fresh water lakes and reclaimed enough land from it to add another province
into the Netherlands called Flevoland
the Dutch claimed enough land from the sea by doing this
that it was twice the size of Singapore
and this amazing feat of engineering led some to
speculate about what else they might be capable of achieving
and thus we arrive in 2011 and encounter a man named
Thijs Zonneveld who first proposed the idea to build the mountain in a news column
Zonneveld suggested that the flat Netherlands
needed a mountain 2 kilometers tall and 5 kilometers wide
such a huge geographic feature he argued
would greatly benefit Dutch sports
as the Netherlands has struggled before in games like skiing and bobsledding
a 2 kilometer tall mountain would also enable
Dutch athletes to train at higher altitudes at home
instead of going somewhere else to train
a 2 kilometer tall giant man made mountain
would also probably become a pretty big tourist attraction
as it would easily become the tallest man made structure ever build
the Burj Khalifa the current man made structure in the world
is only 828 meters tall
witch is less than half the height that this mountain would be
it was also suggested
that the mountain could provide a huge surface to place solar panels on
in addition to windmills at higher altitudes
witch together could provide Europe with an enormous amount of clean and renewable energy
but the most hilarious part about the construction of this mountain
would be the numerous problems that it would probably cause
first of all it actually probably possible
to build something like this in real life
if the mountain was solid though it would tak up an insane
7.7 billion cubic meters of sand and rocks
reacquiring that much material is actually doable
but the estimated price tag of over
7 trillion dollars to finish the mountain
when accounting for all the time and labor that it would take just makes it seem silly
for reference NASA has estimated before
that the price to establish a permanently manned base on mars
would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 trillion dollars
so we could either send hundreds of people to Mars
and establish multiple bases or give the Dutch
a mountain so their athletes don't have to travel to Ostria
to train for winter sports its a pretty tough choice, but consider
also what the mountain would do to the surrounding country side
concentrating that much material that's mostly flat and below sea level
would probably affect all the land in a 50 kilometer radius around it
all of that land could sink by as much as 100 meters
witch would put it almost certainly below sea level witch means yeah
the mountain would probably turn into an island surrounded by a lake
this lead designers to propose reclaiming more land
form the sea and building the mountain just off the coast of the Netherlands
but this just brought up even more problems
building anywhere here off the coast of Zeeland or in this lake
was determined that it would too badly effect shipping routes near the port of Rotterdam
and building in this lake would create
a weird tall obstacle for pilots landing nearby Amsterdam Schiphol airport
basically the geography of the Netherlands is flat for a reason
and there is really no good place for a mountain in the middle of nowhere
this led Zonneveld and some of the designers suggesting a smaller mountain
just 1 kilometer tall or even one just 300 meters tall
but a 300 meter tall mountain is less of a mountain
and more of a hill isn't it?
over the past 2 years that i have been making videos on this channel
I've gotten a lot of suggestions and requests
from you guys related to RealLifeLore merch
so i'm proud to announce that it's finally happening
if you wanna get a RealLifeLore t-shirt or a hoodie with eighter
with either a windmill or a car that may or may not be a Toyota Corola on it
you can finally do so by clicking the link in the description
and heading over to standard.tc/reallifelore
if I ever see one of you guys wearing one of these in public
I promise ill say something similar to thank you
but even better the first 50 people to checkout the website
and place their order
will get 10% off whatever you get by using the code "TOYOTA" at checkout
thanks so much for cheking it out
and don't forget to subscribe if you're new
and ill see you next week for another brand new video then