Solarpunk is innately about hope for a better future, but Desert is rather about the impossibility to save the world from climate change and the opportunities for anarchy that arise after the world’s end. It’s not as if Desert is devoid of hope, but rather it sees hope and possibilities within the end of the world. In that respect, there is some overlap with solarpunk, but I can’t help but think the nihilism doesn’t jive well with the solarpunk ethos.
I guess its just me, but the first half I can apprechiate for it being innovative at the time of writing (but it is an old hat now), while the latter part is the same old story told million times before more or less.