The US space agency NASA says that the world’s major fresh water reserves have begun to decline suddenly over the past decade.
Billions of people around the world rely on fresh water sources for drinking and energy. 70% of the world’s water is used for agriculture. At least 10% of animals live in freshwater environments. More than a decade ago, scientists warned that if governments fail to take effective measures, the decline in water sources will reduce the future population of these environments by half by 2050.
The decline in fresh water indicates that the Earth’s continents have entered a continuous dry period.
An international team of scientists identified this decline using the NASA-German Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellites.
Analyzing the data collected from observations, they found evidence of a sudden decline in May 2014. Measurements from 2015 through last year showed that the average amount of fresh water on Earth was 290 cubic miles less than the average between 2002 and 2014.
NASA Goddard meteorologist Michael Bozelovitch said that one problem with heavy precipitation (rain or snow) is that the water runs off rather than being absorbed and added to groundwater storage.
He said that warming temperatures increase both the ability of water to evaporate from the surface and the ability of the atmosphere to hold water, which increases the severity and frequency of droughts.
