Unsustainable water use
depleting the world's major aquifers
Dec. 22, 2012 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers say gravity-monitoring satellites have recorded drops in groundwater levels in many places across the globe during the past nine years.
Scientists at the University of California Center for Hydrologic Modeling in Irvine said water has been disappearing beneath southern Argentina, western Australia and stretches of the United States, ScienceNews.org reported.
The findings raise concerns farmers are pumping too much water out of the ground in dry regions, researchers said.
"Groundwater is being depleted at a rapid clip in virtually of all of the major aquifers in the world's arid and semiarid regions," hydrologist Jay Famiglietti said.
The drop is especially severe in parts of California, India, the Middle East and China, where expanding agriculture has increased water demand, the researchers said.
"People are using groundwater faster than it can be naturally recharged," Matthew Rodell, a hydrologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., said.
Current water use in many areas has become unsustainable, another researcher said.
"There are too many areas in the world where groundwater development far exceeds a sustainable level," Leonard Konikow, a hydrogeologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, said. "Something will have to change."
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During an August 2011 videoconference in Chicago, USA, Supreme Master Ching Hai addressed the serious need to wisely use Earth’s limited water supplies.
Supreme Master Ching Hai: You must have witnessed firsthand, while traveling, what life is like for people who don’t have enough safe water to drink, to apply to their crops, or even to keep themselves clean and not sick, for their children even. Children are even more vulnerable, more sensitive, to the unhygienic environment and unclean water. But most of the water is to grow the grains and soya beans, again, to feed the animals, not humans.
The livestock industry is becoming a bigger and bigger threat to our water supplies, which scientists warn are shrinking worldwide, fast, due to climate change. Also what causes climate change? Animal industry as well. So we are in a devil’s cycle here.
So, while this staggering waste of water, of both water and food, is occurring, one billion people in our world lack access to safe drinking water and go hungry.
Such tragedies could be minimized or even averted if everyone became vegan, because the vegan diet saves nearly 70% of our precious water resources. 70%.
Supreme Master Ching Hai: You must have witnessed firsthand, while traveling, what life is like for people who don’t have enough safe water to drink, to apply to their crops, or even to keep themselves clean and not sick, for their children even. Children are even more vulnerable, more sensitive, to the unhygienic environment and unclean water. But most of the water is to grow the grains and soya beans, again, to feed the animals, not humans.
The livestock industry is becoming a bigger and bigger threat to our water supplies, which scientists warn are shrinking worldwide, fast, due to climate change. Also what causes climate change? Animal industry as well. So we are in a devil’s cycle here.
So, while this staggering waste of water, of both water and food, is occurring, one billion people in our world lack access to safe drinking water and go hungry.
Such tragedies could be minimized or even averted if everyone became vegan, because the vegan diet saves nearly 70% of our precious water resources. 70%.
Groundwater dropping globally
Satellites find supply falling mostly due to agriculture
January 14, 2012
SAN FRANCISCO — Groundwater levels have dropped in many places across the globe over the past nine years, a pair of gravity-monitoring satellites finds. This trend raises concerns that farmers are pumping too much water out of the ground in dry regions.
Water has been disappearing beneath southern Argentina, western Australia and stretches of the United States. The decline is especially pronounced in parts of California, India, the Middle East and China, where expanding agriculture has increased water demand.
“Groundwater is being depleted at a rapid clip in virtually of all of the major aquifers in the world's arid and semiarid regions,” says Jay Famiglietti, a hydrologist at the University of California Center for Hydrologic Modeling in Irvine, whose team presented the new trends December 6 at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union.
Famiglietti and his colleagues detect water hidden below the surface using the modern equivalent of a dowsing rod: a pair of car-sized satellites, nicknamed Tom and Jerry, that are especially sensitive to the tug of gravity from below.
As the spacecraft chase each other around the planet like their cat and mouse namesakes, they are pulled apart and pushed together by areas of higher or lower gravity. Mountains and other large concentrations of mass have a big, obvious effect that’s consistent from month to month. But water moves around over time, creating small gravity fluctuations that the satellites’ orbital motions respond to.
It takes a lot of flow to noticeably change the distance between the satellites. After subtracting the contributions of snowpack, rivers, lakes and soil moisture, scientists can detect changes in groundwater greater than a centimeter over an area about the size of Illinois.
This joint mission between NASA and the German Aerospace Center — called the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, or GRACE — has been creating monthly snapshots of global groundwater since 2002. The trends now identified in this data help fill in monitoring gaps and confirm problems in places where official groundwater information is unreliable or nonexistent.
“GRACE is very good for areas of the world where we don’t have good ground observations,” says Marc Bierkens, a hydrologist who studies groundwater at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.
China, for example, has been shown to underestimate groundwater use. The country lacks the nationwide network of monitoring wells found in the United States. GRACE’s measurements suggest that water levels have been dropping six or seven centimeters per year beneath plains in the northeast.
In some areas, short-term climate variability may be to blame. For example, the plains of Patagonia in Argentina and areas across the southeastern United States — areas that have been hit hard by droughts — store less groundwater today than they did in 2002.
But there’s little doubt as to what’s behind the biggest drops: farming. An agricultural boom in northern India has helped to squeeze nearly 18 cubic kilometers of water from the ground every year (SN: 9/12/09, p. 5). That’s enough water to fill more than seven million Olympic swimming pools. And in California’s Central Valley, which supports about one-sixth of the nation’s irrigated land, the ground has been sinking for decades as landowners drill more wells and pull out almost 4 cubic kilometers of water per year (SN: 1/16/10, p. 14).
“People are using groundwater faster than it can be naturally recharged,” says Matthew Rodell, a hydrologist and GRACE team member at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
Agricultural pressures are particularly worrisome in places like the Middle East, another hotspot on the new GRACE map. Water pumped out of the Arabian aquifer beneath Saudi Arabia and surrounding countries today fell as rain thousands of years ago. Once this fossil water disappears, there’s little new rainfall to replenish it.
Climate change will only worsen the problem, says Famiglietti. Precipitation patterns are becoming more extreme, increasing the severity of droughts. Wet areas are also becoming wetter and dry areas drier, which may accelerate declines in groundwater in some places over the coming years.
But even as the researchers sound the alarm, they don’t know how loud to crank up the volume. GRACE reveals only changes in groundwater. It doesn’t divulge how much water is left.
“We don’t really know how stressed the world’s largest aquifers are,” says Sasha Richey of the University of California Center for Hydrologic Modeling.
Some reservoirs, like the giant Nubian Aquifer that underlies North Africa, may be large enough to meet demand for centuries. But few reliable estimates exist of the amount of groundwater stored in the world’s aquifers.
Despite the uncertainties, Leonard Konikow, a hydrogeologist at the U.S. Geological Survey in Reston, Va., says that water use has become unsustainable in many places. Better irrigation systems that use less water could help to curb the problem, he says. So could channeling water during especially wet periods into aquifers instead of letting it run off into the ocean.
“There are too many areas in the world where groundwater development far exceeds a sustainable level,” says Konikow. “Something will have to change.”
DRYING OUT
A simulation based on data from the GRACE satellites and historical weather records reveals the effects of this year’s drought in Texas (driest conditions shown in dark red). A new analysis of data from the GRACE satellites reveals worldwide changes in groundwater.
Source
A simulation based on data from the GRACE satellites and historical weather records reveals the effects of this year’s drought in Texas (driest conditions shown in dark red). A new analysis of data from the GRACE satellites reveals worldwide changes in groundwater.
Source
Action needed to avoid world water crisis, UN says
By 2030, nearly half of the world's people will be living in areas of acute water shortage, said a report issued ahead of a major conference in Istanbul.
The world needs to act urgently to avoid a global water crisis due to increased population, rising living standards, dietary changes and more biofuels production, the United Nations warned on Thursday.
By 2030, nearly half of the world's people will be living in areas of acute water shortage, said a report jointly produced by more than two dozen U.N. bodies and issued ahead of a major conference on water to be held in Istanbul next week.
The report, "Water in a Changing World" made "clear that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid a global water crisis," said a foreword by Koichiro Matsuura, head of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
"Despite the vital importance of water to all aspects of human life, the sector has been plagued by a chronic lack of political support, poor governance and underinvestment."
"As a result, hundreds of millions of people around the world remain trapped in poverty and ill health and exposed to the risk of water-related disasters, environmental degradation and even political instability and conflict," Matsuura said.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has repeatedly identified water shortage as a major underlying cause of the conflict in Darfur, western Sudan, which began with a rebellion against the central government six years ago. Water is also a major issue between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
The world's population of 6.6 billion is forecast to rise by 2.5 billion by 2050, with most of the growth in developing countries, many in regions where water is already scarce.
The growth rate means demand for fresh water is increasing by 64 billion cubic meters a year, the report said. Authors told a news conference that most of North Africa and the Middle East had already reached the limits of their water resources.
The world needs to act urgently to avoid a global water crisis due to increased population, rising living standards, dietary changes and more biofuels production, the United Nations warned on Thursday.
By 2030, nearly half of the world's people will be living in areas of acute water shortage, said a report jointly produced by more than two dozen U.N. bodies and issued ahead of a major conference on water to be held in Istanbul next week.
The report, "Water in a Changing World" made "clear that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid a global water crisis," said a foreword by Koichiro Matsuura, head of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
"Despite the vital importance of water to all aspects of human life, the sector has been plagued by a chronic lack of political support, poor governance and underinvestment."
"As a result, hundreds of millions of people around the world remain trapped in poverty and ill health and exposed to the risk of water-related disasters, environmental degradation and even political instability and conflict," Matsuura said.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has repeatedly identified water shortage as a major underlying cause of the conflict in Darfur, western Sudan, which began with a rebellion against the central government six years ago. Water is also a major issue between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
The world's population of 6.6 billion is forecast to rise by 2.5 billion by 2050, with most of the growth in developing countries, many in regions where water is already scarce.
The growth rate means demand for fresh water is increasing by 64 billion cubic meters a year, the report said. Authors told a news conference that most of North Africa and the Middle East had already reached the limits of their water resources.
Biofuels risk
Migration from the countryside to cities was also increasing water use, the 318-page report said, as was growing consumption of meat -- the production of which requires more water than vegetables -- in China and elsewhere.
The report added to recent U.N. warnings about the downsides of developing biofuels to replace heavily polluting hydrocarbons as an energy source, because of the water needed to grow crops like corn and sugar cane to produce ethanol.
Saying about 2,500 liters of water is needed to make 1 liter of biofuel, it said implementing all current national biofuel policies and plans would take 180 cubic kilometers of extra irrigation water and 30 million hectares of cropland.
"The impact could be large for some countries, including China and India, and for some regions of large countries, such as the United States," it said. "There could also be significant implications for water resources, with possible feedback into global grain markets."
When oil prices peaked at over $140 a barrel last year, "the kneejerk reaction was 'well, we are going to grow our energy - biofuels.' But nobody took account of how much water it was going to require," William Cosgrove, coordinator of the report, told journalists.
On the positive side, the report pointed to successful water policies in Uganda and Turkey and said a U.N. goal of halving the population lacking access to safe drinking water by 2015 would be achieved except in sub-Saharan Africa.
But it said in many countries water policies failed to make any impact because key decisions affecting water were made in other sectors of the economy.
Government and business leaders needed to act now to boost investment in water infrastructure, it said, adding, "Unsustainable management and inequitable access to water resources cannot continue."
Source
Migration from the countryside to cities was also increasing water use, the 318-page report said, as was growing consumption of meat -- the production of which requires more water than vegetables -- in China and elsewhere.
The report added to recent U.N. warnings about the downsides of developing biofuels to replace heavily polluting hydrocarbons as an energy source, because of the water needed to grow crops like corn and sugar cane to produce ethanol.
Saying about 2,500 liters of water is needed to make 1 liter of biofuel, it said implementing all current national biofuel policies and plans would take 180 cubic kilometers of extra irrigation water and 30 million hectares of cropland.
"The impact could be large for some countries, including China and India, and for some regions of large countries, such as the United States," it said. "There could also be significant implications for water resources, with possible feedback into global grain markets."
When oil prices peaked at over $140 a barrel last year, "the kneejerk reaction was 'well, we are going to grow our energy - biofuels.' But nobody took account of how much water it was going to require," William Cosgrove, coordinator of the report, told journalists.
On the positive side, the report pointed to successful water policies in Uganda and Turkey and said a U.N. goal of halving the population lacking access to safe drinking water by 2015 would be achieved except in sub-Saharan Africa.
But it said in many countries water policies failed to make any impact because key decisions affecting water were made in other sectors of the economy.
Government and business leaders needed to act now to boost investment in water infrastructure, it said, adding, "Unsustainable management and inequitable access to water resources cannot continue."
Source
