Clone base environment in anaconda

I would recommend that you try the method as shown on this official documentation. In summary, you can get all the list of modules installed in the virtual environment, save it as a .txt file, and create a new environment from that .txt file. For example,

conda list --explicit > spec-file.txt

Then, create a new environment using that specification.

conda create --name myenv --file spec-file.txt

While this is not exactly "cloning" the base environment, you should be able to reproduce a virtual environment identical to the base through this process.

You just have to refer to the base environment, which is called base and not root:

conda create --name <myenv> --clone base