Archive for January 9, 2015

Erkin | January 9, 2015
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Climate Change Hits Cities

Climate-Change-Hits-CitiesIndore is the fastest-growing city in the central state of Madhya Pradesh, India. The industrial center has grown rapidly in the past 20 years, reaching a population of nearly 3.3 million people. But as the city grows in numbers, its water supply becomes increasingly insecure.

Like many cities in the developing world, Indore’s water infrastructure and institutions face the mounting pressures of population and growth and urbanization. Experts worry that global warming will compound these problems, enlarging a category of people they call the “water poor.”

To better understand the complexity of urban water systems in less developed nations, the Pacific Institute and the Institute for Social and Environmental Transition released a detailed analysis last week on the water situation in Indore. The three-year study involved downscaling climate models to the city level, performing a vulnerability analysis, and engaging with the community to come up with resilience strategies. Read more

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Erkin | January 8, 2015
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Moon Water Differs from Earth Water

The Apollo moon missions ended almost 40 years ago. But for lunar scientists, they’re gifts that keep on giving. Researchers studying rocks brought back by astronauts have found that the moon’s scarce water has a different chemical signature than Earth water. Which leads to the conclusion that the water probably came from comets. The study appears in the journal Nature Geoscience. [James Greenwood et al., “Hydrogen isotope ratios in lunar rocks indicate delivery of cometary water to the Moon“]
Earth and the moon in a Nasa composite imageThe researchers used what’s called an ion microscope to compare the amount of normal hydrogen in the moon rocks to the amount of the hydrogen isotope deuterium, which carries an extra neutron. They found deuterium at higher levels than it’s found in Earth water—but at levels similar to the comets Hale-Bopp, Hyakutake and Halley. Which suggests comets deposited water on the ancient moon, shortly after its formation four-and-a-half billion years ago.

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Erkin | January 6, 2015
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Harmful Algal Blooms Increase as Lake Water Warms

The warming waters of one of central Europe’s most popular holiday destinations, Switzerland’s Lake Zurich, have created an ideal environment for a population explosion of algae including Planktothrix rubescens, a toxic cyanobacterium. It has the potential to harm humans, animals and the tourism that pumps up the economies of lake districts.

vlijanie-prozrachnosti-vodyAlthough harmful algal blooms have been documented for more than a century, recently the number and frequency of cases have drastically increased.

According to research published in leading scientific journals, Lake Zurich is by no means alone. Cyanobacteria now threaten the ecological well-being of some of the world’s largest water bodies, including Lake Victoria in Africa, Lake Erie in the United States and Canada, Lake Taihu in China, the Baltic Sea in northern Europe, and the Caspian Sea in west Asia. They’ve also been found in Lake Kokotel in eastern Siberia, which is next to Lake Baikal, the world’s largest, deepest and most ancient freshwater lake. Baikal contains 20 percent of the world’s total unfrozen freshwater reserve. Read more

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