These pictures from NASA are being called “the quiet Chernobyl.” It is the Aral Sea as seen in 2000 and as seen this year. The massive decline of water levels is particularly evident from the black line showing the shoreline in the 1960s. In the United States and other cities, the world is facing a water crisis that is being given relatively low amount of attention. However, pictures like these show vividly our self-destructive impact on the environment.
The once vast central Asian lake was devastated during the Soviet period due to a water diversion project in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Now here is the shocker stat: the Aral Sea was once the fourth largest lake in the world. It now hold less than 10% of its original water volume.
The destruction of the lake created in 2000 two separate lakes known the Small and Large Seas. Within 12 months, however, the southern lake was gone. Fisheries and other business have collapsed and the blowing dust from the exposed lakebed is now a health hazard due to the agricultural chemicals that polluted the lake. It has changed the local weather — the loss of the moderating water mass has made the winters and summers harsher.
These pictures are the work of the team for the Terra satellite studies.
It is a cautionary tale for all countries, including this one, of the cascading problems associated with environmental pollution and industrial overuse.
Sad. The Soviets were terrible polluters with an abysmal environmental record.
35,000 walruses ‘haul out’ on Alaska beach
By Brad Lendon, CNN
October 1, 2014
http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/01/us/alaska-massive-walrus-gathering/index.html
Excerpt:
(CNN) — Arctic ice is dwindling, the waters of the North Pacific Ocean are the warmest on record and tens of thousands of walruses have taken notice, “hauling out” on an Alaskan beach in numbers never seen before.
FYI: Perhaps we need to define terms.
Internet troll: “In Internet slang, a troll (/ˈtroʊl/, /ˈtrɒl/) is a person who sows discord on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people,[1] by posting inflammatory,[2] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[3] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion.[4]”
As to water as a public right vs commodity for sale. I’m curious. What do you guys think about water companies that charge for the delivery of water. Public right that should be free? or a commodity and service that the subscribers are purchasing? This is pertinent to the discussion of diverting water from one source (Owens Valley, Aral Sea) to deliver for a price to another location.
Who “owns” the water in your pond or lake on your property? How about the water under your property? These are all very complex questions that if this drought out west continues we are likely to see in the courts.
maxcat06 & Annie ~ I proudly join your “Band of Trolls.”
Earlier this year I watched (and I think posted) a youtube video of the Nestle Group CEO declaring that human beings who think water is a public right have it all wrong. Water, in his mind, is a foodstuff like any other and should have a market value. I can just guess what’s next on the list for market valuation — clean breathable air.
Maxcat,
No bottled water for me, seems crazy to pay for water one really has no idea if it’s any cleaner than tap water. Plus all that plastic! I’ve got a filter on my fridge water and kitchen faucet. Years ago here was a Crypto Sporidium outbreak in Milwaukee water, lots of folks got quite sick. I think the Water Dept. put some extra safeguards in after that, I haven’t heard any more about Milwaukee water being tainted. Both Milwaukee and Chicago blame each other for polluting Lake Michigan, hopefully it wont become a dead lake like Lake Erie is.
@Annie,
It’s sad; I lived in Buffalo when they were in the process of actually cleaning up Lake Erie. Too bad it didn’t last.
DBQ.
Good for you. That was a horrifying story.
@maxcat06
“I’m imagining those of you who live in California are aware of them, if you aren’t too busy writing to the governor about those trains.”
I am VERY aware of them. We (the people in our area in general) put a stop to a proposed plant that would have taken huge amounts of water for a bottling plant. We have pristine water in many areas that doesn’t require any treatment. One spring that is nearby is still producing pre-atomic era water (no radioactive markers as is found in most water sources). No one has any idea of the source of much of our water, which is why we are very protective about it.
The fear was that they would or could suck the aquifer dry. So the little town, which could really have used the money and jobs said…hit the bricks Nestle.
@Daniel
Crichton wasn’t even honest in State of Fear. He took a climatologist’s three line graph, turned it into a one line graph, and claimed it accurate.
Annie, I’m right beside you on this. I’ll join you, if need be, as a proud troll.
Now, I’m going to go even more troll like and no, I’m not going to be all environmental, and I’m not even going to slam the Koch brothers, but I am going to mention the Nestle Company (Corporation). I’m imagining those of you who live in California are aware of them, if you aren’t too busy writing to the governor about those trains.
In the hardest hit areas of what can now be called the California desert, the Nestle people are busy digging deeper wells and, yes, they are finding water. Good news, right? Well, no. Their water isn’t for the people of California, just like the Keystone Pipeline oil isn’t going to be for the people of the United States. The water is being used for Nestles bottled water that’s shipped all over the country, marketed as “spring” water, or whatever they choose to call it.
I’m not totally blaming Nestle. Their business practices probably are no worse than many. The question is…WHO is still buying bottled water? Get a filter, stick it on your kitchen faucet, or buy a Brita or some other brand and put it in your refrigerator. There are many portable cups/thermos/Tervis tumblers available that can be reused. For all those who don’t want government regulations, become environmentally aware. Don’t waste plastic, or California’s water.
State of Fear has one singular value. It demonstrates how people twist science into a political tool to scare the population into a desired behavior.
What is remarkable is that people then use that as further ‘proof’ that supporters of climate change are the bad guy in all of this. After all, doesn’t the current crop of global warming supporters also want people to change how they do things, just like in the book!?
It doesn’t even matter who is right anymore, I would just like both sides to admit that they use the fear of something as a way to control the masses. It used to be Acid Rain, or DDT, or lead, or asbestos, now it’s Global Warming. Give it a few years and some other science will come out with some new scare, and people will pick a side and fight about it. It is nothing new, and while Crichton’s book is entertaining, it is not the first of its kind, and it is not the last.
And one other thing…
Michael Crichton was a M.D. not a climatologist. And since he spent most of his life outside the medical and scientific establishment, his interpretations and opinions on the then available data on climate change, are interesting, but pretty much worthless a decade after he published State of Fear. Sorry, but old data does not trump all the data that follows it. Not that it matters, Crichton decided which side was right, and once someone does that, there is no point in more data.
I do miss his books though. He definitely had a gift.
Why talk about trolls on other blogs? A reasonable person would assume you were speaking of trolls on THIS blog, DBQ.
Annie – you realize that if we start transferring information from one blog to another some people’s dirty laundry is going to be exposed.
Paul, I have NO idea what you are referring to.
Paul, you’ll have to enlighten us all.
DBQ, so then, just WHO are these “trolls” you speak so eloquently of? Why bring up trolls at all?
I don’t believe I called anyone on this blog a troll. It is uncivil to try to put words into my mouth that I did not say. Perhaps you could refrain from misquoting me or mis-characterizing my posts. Thank you.
on 1, October 1, 2014 at 4:02 pmDredd
oops, I meant history preachers.
***********************
Dredd, yep.
DBQ,
I believe calling other commenters “trolls” is considered uncivil on this blog. And remember a “troll” is in the eye of a beholder. I am seeing a shift in the consciousness here, it’s refreshing.
As the the California/West Coast drought. I strongly object to the State coming in and putting meters on individual-small production-residential types of wells. Mainly because 1) they are not the problem users and 2) once the government gets a foot in the door and control, they will never ever ever let go. So once this crisis is over, just like the last ones, the heavy hand of government doesn’t let go. If they try this….there WILL be problems. Big ones.
However, I do not have too many issues with some monitoring or metering of the large agricultural users. They are drawing down the aquifers at an alarming rate. Many users are conservation minded, but I can attest,from personal observations, that many more are not. They are using water in the same old ways that they have always done. When times were ‘wetter’, so to speak, and the either cannot for financial reasons will not change their ways or for personal reasons refuse to consider new methods.
By metering and finding the abusers, we can make changes. If financial considerations, such as not being able to completely reconfigure the plumbing and delivery systems are what is preventing the change, the State of California should be diverting funds to help those producers make positive changes. Instead of wasting BILLIONS of dollars on a train to nowhere between two places NO ONE wants to go anyway. http://www.laweekly.com/informer/2012/07/06/california-bullet-train-to-nowhere-gets-6-billion-via-state-lawmakers They could be using the funds to increase agricultural production and increase conservative uses of resources. A project that would benefit millions of people not just in California, but those who enjoy produce and meat from the State.
But….noooooo. ….we must have fast train that very few people will use.
“it doesn’t do the blog any good to promote ignoring people you don’t like”
Agreed. I find that on any blog there are commentators who are just impossible to reason with or to have a decent conversation. I don’t “promote” ignoring. I just do it when it is necessary.
Feeding the troll is a technique that will never be helpful and will always just encourage more bad behavior.
An good example of humanity causing devastation to a resource and suffering the consequences is the dust bowl in the United States during the 1930s.
Poor soil management and tilling coupled magnified the damage resulting from the drought. And just when it seemed there was some relief years later a tremendous locust swarm whiped out what was left.
A soil conservation movement then was instigated by the federal government which developed better tilling and farming techniques to minimize soil loss and the effects of damage.
One additional recommendation was to help address the locust problem from reoccurring when eggs within the soil hatched the conservation districts recommended a plowing technique that might help. It worked famously as the locusts afterward became extinct.
So it is possible for humanity to right environmental wrongs in many occasions. It just is a matter of will.
Nick,
I’m certain you’re pleased to see the positive changes in JT’s blog over the last year because you seldom let a day go by to announce it. So I’m sure you’ll “keep pointing it out”. 😉
Personally, I believe these blogs are a terrific tool for exercising our critical-thinking skills. And as well-intentioned as you might be, providing an unsolicited scouting report on the various members of this blog shunts that development and it might actually enable the climate you’re trying so hard to prevent.
BTW, it doesn’t do the blog any good to promote ignoring people you don’t like. If we cannot develop communication skills to work with the various styles then we have a problem.
oops, I meant history preachers.
Annie
It’s amazing, simply amazing that despite MANY admonitions from JT not to bring up past disagreements some still completely ignore them and seem to think that admonitions don’t apply to them. Why is this?
================================
Some are history challenged.
Especially those who fancy themselves as history teachers.
Dredd – isn’t it the job of history teachers to remind of the past? Just sayin’?