Drying Lakes, Drying Streams, Drying Rivers: Blame Climate Change for Drying Water Bodies

Lake Titicaca, Credit, Yahoo News

Earlier in the week, news broke that Lake Titicaca, the largest freshwater lake in South America and the highest navigable lake in the world, faced a challenge through dropping water levels, with the precipitation there forty percent lower than the average from August 2022 until March 2023, a period that included the rainy season, putting the lives of three million people who depend on it at a risk.

Lake Chad, a water source for between 20 to 30 million people, battles the problem of declining water levels, with the lake's size having decreased by 90 percent in the past 60 years, its surface areas plummeting from 26,000 square kilometers in 1962 to less than 1,500 square kilometers today, social and environmental issues arising from the situation.

The Aral Sea used to be the world's fourth largest body of inland water, but it dries up through a combination of reasons, including evaporation, its eastern lobe disappearing by 2014 because a drought lasted from 2005 to 2009, putting people who relied on sea to challenges too numerous to be mentioned.

The issue of drying up lakes isn't restricted to Lake Titicaca, Lake Chad, or the Aral sea, because  a recent study  discovered that the world's largest lakes shrunk by 53 percent between 1992 and 2020, an astonishing 22 percent of gigatonnes of water lost per year during this period, an equivalent to 17 times the volume of Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the United States.

One analysis of close to 2,000 lakes that comprised of about 95 percent of lake water worldwide indicated that around 36 percent of water loss in lakes could be attributable to climate change, while a combination of climate change and human consumption could be responsible for between 47 to 65 percent of the water loss.

In the same study  -  analysing the largest lakes through three decades of satellite observation, climate data, and hydologic study - experts found that as much as 87 percent of the earth's liquid surface freshwater faces threats from climate change and human activities.

In yet another study  that gathered its information from databases, including the Global Network of Isotopes in Rivers, global sea levels show increases, but the surface water of lakes experienced declines, as climate change from global warming posed a major obstacle to lake water budget and quality through rising temperatures.

While human activities hold some blame for the drop in water levels of lakes, climate change, as can be seen from the studies cited, also plays an important part in a situation that has seen a 53 percent fall in water bodies of the world's largest lakes from 1992 to 2020.

South America ranks fifth among the world's continents in terms of population, accounting for 5.3 percent of humanity at 430,759,766 people as of July 1, 2020, but by 2030, the number could rise to 461,853870, and increase to 491,471897 by 2050, then rise to 473,385,424 by 2077.

Africa ranks higher than South America in terms of the number of its inhabitants, with its population as of July 1, 2021 put at close to 1.37 billion people, but by 2030, the number could explode to 1.68 billion people, 2.48 billion by 2050, and 3.67 billion inhabitants by 2077.

Asia occupies the position of the most populated continent by a massive margin at 4.68 billion as its estimated population by July 1, 2021, but the number could hit 4.97 billion by 2030, 5.29 million by 2050, and 5.11 billion by 2077.

With Asia, Africa, and the rest continents experiencing population rises between now and the near future, one in four of the world's largest cities could be stressed over water, particularly when the world's inhabitants expand at a time when lake waters decline in quantity.

When cities become water stressed, shortages and tensions drive conflicts, the situation that led to the migration of millions of people and  an estimated 350,000 people killed, following the drying up of Lake Chad.

The migration of people could result in the disruption to food production, an inevitable trend, especially when experts project that up to 216 million internal climate migrants could be around by 2050.

The combination of water stressed cities, migration of millions of people, as well as conflicts could further fuel unimaginable suffering, likely to be acute in places like Africa, where the population could reach as much as 3.57 billion by 2077.

Needless to say, climate change provides one of the factors behind drying lakes. It stands as one of the culprits behind drying streams. It can be blamed as one of the reasons behind drying rivers. The reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases could slow the dryness of water bodies.

Four top wind energy products

Wind turbines, Credit, Architecture Digest

As climate change intensifies, new technologies must emerge. Wind energy technologies might be an idea for the future for creators, founders, and investors. Here are a few of them.

(1) Wind turbine. They show up in different ways, with horizontal-axis and vertical axis turbines common. The leading makers include Vestas, Siemens Gamesa, and GE Renewable Energy.

The wind turbine market size is forecast to expand from 100 gigawatt in 2023 to 655 gigawatt by 2028 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 46.66 percent

(2) Wind Farm Management Software:

Software solutions for monitoring and optimizing wind farm operations, such as SCADA systems and predictive maintenance tools.

The global wind turbine operations and maintenance market was expected to expand at USD28.12 billion in 2021 and is forecast to hit USD 53.65 billion by 2030 at a CAGR of 7.4 percent during the forecast period of 2022 to 2030.

(3) Energy Storage System

Batteries and energy storage technologies store excess wind energy for use when the wind isn't blowing.

The energy storage devices market is forecast to reach USD USD4.09 billion by 2029 at a CAGR of 6.4 percent during the forecast period.

(4) Off shore Wind Platforms:

They require specialized platforms and foundations for deep-sea installations.

The offshore wind market got a value of USD34.46 billion in 2019 and is expected to get to USD91.74 billion by 2027 expanding  at a CAGR of 15.46 percent  during the forecast period 2020 to 2027.

What to Eat

Vegan food from Chad Republic, Credit, Notes from a Messy Kitchen