In my previous blogpost, I talked briefly about how climate change and water resources were closely intertwined. For this post, I will discuss how this intimate relationship between climate and water can result in (and is already on its way to becoming) a severe crisis for the already constrained water resources in Africa.
Firstly, water as a whole influences, and is influenced by the climate (Kundzewicz, 2008). Many studies show that climate change will affect Earth’s hydrological cycle, temperature balance, and rainfall. For example, an increase in global temperature would directly impact hydrological fluxes such as evapotranspiration rates, as well as surface water and groundwater flows. This is crucial because it affects freshwater resources (i.e. lakes), thus adding pressure on existing water availability, accessibility, and demand. In fact, the volume of water in Lake Chad, which used to be one of Africa’s biggest freshwater lakes, has decreased significantly (45000km2 in 1960 to 10000km2 in 1998) due to effects of climate change (Oelkers et al., 2011). This can be seen in the figure below.
The disappearance of Lake Chad is detrimental because it affects several Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries that border it, like Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Chad. These countries are already very water stressed because they face economic water scarcity as a result of lacking funds to build proper water supply related infrastructure (African Climate Policy Centre, 2011). Hence, the deteriorating lake spells out even more trouble for communities in these countries.
Secondly, according to Kusangaya et al. (2014), the effects of climate change will directly and indirectly implicate both socio-economic and biophysical environments. This includes “agriculture, health, ecosystems and biodiversity, and energy generation”. Besides increasing global temperatures, rainfall patterns are also affected by climate change. Considering that 80% of agricultural land in Africa is sustained by rainfall, and is one of, if not, the main industry in many SSA countries (Ngoran, Dogah and Xue, 2015), a disruption to current water resources would definitely alter agriculture productivity. Eventually, causing negative impacts on a socio-economic level. However, it is important to note that these negative impacts are felt on different scales depending on one’s income level. Poorer people would suffer more in comparison to the rich, due to lacking enough disposable income to seek alternative water sources, such as irrigation pumps for their farms. As a result, their farms become less efficient, which results in lower productivity , leading to falling incomes and a lower standard of living, putting these undeserving farmers in a vicious cycle of poverty.
Another cause for concern with regards to the declining water supply as a result of climate change is the energy generation sector, more specifically hydroelectric power. A study done on hydroelectric power stations in the Zambezi River Basin by Yamba et al. (2011) concluded that the increase in drought and flood events from climate change would hinder power generating effectiveness. During droughts, run-off rates and reservoir storage capacity decreases, lowering power generating competence. During floods, the increase in water capacity could impair hydroelectric infrastructure. This in turn thwarts with positive economic development (Climdev-Africa, 2013), thus restricting many people wanting to get out of the poverty cycle. Thus, this shows that there is a run-off (no pun intended) effect of climate change on the development of developing countries in Africa, such as a decrease in the efficiency of hydroelectricity sources.
Therefore, it appears that not only climate and water are closely interlinked, but important economic sectors such as agriculture and energy generation are included in this equation. While it is pretty obvious that with climate change comes alterations to the water cycle, which disrupts the already constrained water resources and its distribution within African countries, it did not occur to me that it would impact other sectors, especially energy generation. My initial assumption of Africa being a dry continent led to me wrongly thinking that it would not even utilize water as an energy source, yet I was proven wrong after doing my research for this week’s post.
Reference:
African Climate Policy Centre (2011). Climate Change and Water Resources of Africa: Challenges, Opportunities and Impacts. United Nations Economic Commission For Africa Working Paper 5. Available at: http://repository.uneca.org/bitstream/handle/10855/21058/Bib-20389.pdf?sequence=1
Climdev-Africa. (2013). Climate Change and Water in Africa: Challenges, Opportunities and Recommendations. United Nations Economic Commission for Africa Policy Brief 4. Available at: https://www.uneca.org/publications/policy-brief-4-climate-change-and-water-africa-challenges-opportunities-and
Kusangaya, S., Warburton, M. L., Garderen, E. A., & Jewitt, G. P. (2014). Impacts of climate change on water resources in southern Africa: A review. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts A/B/C, 67-69, 47-54. doi:10.1016/j.pce.2013.09.014
Ngoran, S. D., Dogah, K. E., & Xue, X. (2015). Assessing the Impacts of Climate Change on Water Resources: The Sub-Saharan Africa Perspective. Journal of Economics and Sustainable Development,6(1), 185-193.
Oelkers, E. H., Hering, J. G., & Zhu, C. (2011). Water: Is there a global crisis?. Elements , 7 (3), 157-162.
Kundzewicz, Z. W. (2008). Climate change impacts on the hydrological cycle. Ecohydrology and Hydrobiology,8(2-4), 195-203. Doi: 10.2478/v10104-009-0015-y
Yamba, F.D., Walimwipi, H., Jain, S., Zhou, P., Cuamba, B., Mzezewa, C., (2011). Climate change/variability implications on hydroelectricity generation in the Zambezi River Basin. Mitigation and Adaption Strategies for Global Change 16, 617–628.
Firstly, water as a whole influences, and is influenced by the climate (Kundzewicz, 2008). Many studies show that climate change will affect Earth’s hydrological cycle, temperature balance, and rainfall. For example, an increase in global temperature would directly impact hydrological fluxes such as evapotranspiration rates, as well as surface water and groundwater flows. This is crucial because it affects freshwater resources (i.e. lakes), thus adding pressure on existing water availability, accessibility, and demand. In fact, the volume of water in Lake Chad, which used to be one of Africa’s biggest freshwater lakes, has decreased significantly (45000km2 in 1960 to 10000km2 in 1998) due to effects of climate change (Oelkers et al., 2011). This can be seen in the figure below.
Figure 1: Maps showing the decreasing water volume of Lake Chad from 1963 to 2001
(Source: : http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/imageo/2013/10/20/lake-chad-shrinking-beauty/)
The disappearance of Lake Chad is detrimental because it affects several Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries that border it, like Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Chad. These countries are already very water stressed because they face economic water scarcity as a result of lacking funds to build proper water supply related infrastructure (African Climate Policy Centre, 2011). Hence, the deteriorating lake spells out even more trouble for communities in these countries.
Secondly, according to Kusangaya et al. (2014), the effects of climate change will directly and indirectly implicate both socio-economic and biophysical environments. This includes “agriculture, health, ecosystems and biodiversity, and energy generation”. Besides increasing global temperatures, rainfall patterns are also affected by climate change. Considering that 80% of agricultural land in Africa is sustained by rainfall, and is one of, if not, the main industry in many SSA countries (Ngoran, Dogah and Xue, 2015), a disruption to current water resources would definitely alter agriculture productivity. Eventually, causing negative impacts on a socio-economic level. However, it is important to note that these negative impacts are felt on different scales depending on one’s income level. Poorer people would suffer more in comparison to the rich, due to lacking enough disposable income to seek alternative water sources, such as irrigation pumps for their farms. As a result, their farms become less efficient, which results in lower productivity , leading to falling incomes and a lower standard of living, putting these undeserving farmers in a vicious cycle of poverty.
Another cause for concern with regards to the declining water supply as a result of climate change is the energy generation sector, more specifically hydroelectric power. A study done on hydroelectric power stations in the Zambezi River Basin by Yamba et al. (2011) concluded that the increase in drought and flood events from climate change would hinder power generating effectiveness. During droughts, run-off rates and reservoir storage capacity decreases, lowering power generating competence. During floods, the increase in water capacity could impair hydroelectric infrastructure. This in turn thwarts with positive economic development (Climdev-Africa, 2013), thus restricting many people wanting to get out of the poverty cycle. Thus, this shows that there is a run-off (no pun intended) effect of climate change on the development of developing countries in Africa, such as a decrease in the efficiency of hydroelectricity sources.
Therefore, it appears that not only climate and water are closely interlinked, but important economic sectors such as agriculture and energy generation are included in this equation. While it is pretty obvious that with climate change comes alterations to the water cycle, which disrupts the already constrained water resources and its distribution within African countries, it did not occur to me that it would impact other sectors, especially energy generation. My initial assumption of Africa being a dry continent led to me wrongly thinking that it would not even utilize water as an energy source, yet I was proven wrong after doing my research for this week’s post.
Reference:
African Climate Policy Centre (2011). Climate Change and Water Resources of Africa: Challenges, Opportunities and Impacts. United Nations Economic Commission For Africa Working Paper 5. Available at: http://repository.uneca.org/bitstream/handle/10855/21058/Bib-20389.pdf?sequence=1
Climdev-Africa. (2013). Climate Change and Water in Africa: Challenges, Opportunities and Recommendations. United Nations Economic Commission for Africa Policy Brief 4. Available at: https://www.uneca.org/publications/policy-brief-4-climate-change-and-water-africa-challenges-opportunities-and
Kusangaya, S., Warburton, M. L., Garderen, E. A., & Jewitt, G. P. (2014). Impacts of climate change on water resources in southern Africa: A review. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts A/B/C, 67-69, 47-54. doi:10.1016/j.pce.2013.09.014
Ngoran, S. D., Dogah, K. E., & Xue, X. (2015). Assessing the Impacts of Climate Change on Water Resources: The Sub-Saharan Africa Perspective. Journal of Economics and Sustainable Development,6(1), 185-193.
Yamba, F.D., Walimwipi, H., Jain, S., Zhou, P., Cuamba, B., Mzezewa, C., (2011). Climate change/variability implications on hydroelectricity generation in the Zambezi River Basin. Mitigation and Adaption Strategies for Global Change 16, 617–628.
Hi there ! I am Julie, also work on the environmental changes and water topic. Your article is pretty nice, and clear, I liked reading it. I worked on Lake Victoria on my last post, but more about biodiversity and invasive species. But, Lake Chad case is really interesting. Do you think the collapse of water level in the lake is only caused by less of precipitations, or more evaportranspiration? Isn't there other explainations like extraction for irrigation (agriculture) or for industrial activites, or mining, or dams ?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, the 5 maps that you added in your article are really impresive, the evolution is so fast, the loss of biodiversity, and also all services that provides to human societies must be considerable. Also, I provide you to have a look on this satellite pic I've noticed one year ago or something like that. This is from ESA Earth Instagram account. https://www.instagram.com/p/BXpkXa5BrEK/?taken-by=esa_earth
Waiting for new posts
Julie
Hello Julie! Sorry for the late response. First of all, thanks for reading my post and for providing me with that link! It was really interesting (and sad) to note the state of Lake Chad.
DeleteAnyway, I don't think that the decrease in precipitation/increase in evapotranspiration are the sole causes of Lake Chad decreasing in volume over the years. Rather, I'd say these factors exacerbate the problems resulting from irresponsible over-extraction of water for agriculture as well as for industrial purposes. That's because even though these industries are withdrawing more water than they should, it's the fact that there is not enough water being replenished (because of the decreasing precipitation and increasing evapotranspiration) that is causing a societal and economic problem for the countries that border Lake Chad.
Julie has asked a very pertinent question. Reply?
ReplyDelete