Tag: water

Incoming: Millions of Water Refugees from Iran

Tehran is at risk of becoming uninhabitable due to a severe drought that has led to a severe water shortage. The drought has been the catalyst to expose decades of government mismanagement that caused Iran’s water supply to run dry. Now, the government is prepared to issue a city-wide evacuation notice in Tehran if the situation worsens.

Rain will not be sufficient to fill the dry reservoir, which was brought about by government mismanagement—farmers protested against the government in 2018 when water levels were low. Protests erupted in 2021 in the southern Khuzestan province as the people blamed the government for water mismanagement. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) controls construction over the main, poorly planned dam, which has resulted in dry rivers and wetlands. Salinity of the water supply has led to a loss of fertile agricultural land. For example, the Govtvand Damn on the Karun River caused saltwater to destroy nearby land over a decade ago, and the situation has not been resolved.

Over 75% of Iran’s land is experiencing groundwater depletion. IRGC-controlled industries receive water as a first priority, and this is used for everything from agriculture to crypto mining. Rural areas are the last to receive water, as it is carefully regulated and rationed by the government. The government has built several new dams with no concern for the ecological implications of diverting water. It is well-known that the nation uses outdated agricultural practices that often require a vast amount of water.

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Iran begins cloud-seeding operations as severe drought bites

The Iranian authorities have launched cloud-seeding operations to induce rainfall as the country 

faces its worst drought in decades, state media reported.

“Today, a cloud-seeding flight was conducted in the Urmia Lake basin for the first time in the current water year (which begins in September),” the official Irna news agency said late on Nov 15.

Urmia, in the north-west, is Iran’s largest lake, but has largely dried out and turned into a vast salt bed due to drought.

Irna added that further operations would be carried out in the provinces of East and West Azerbaijan.

Cloud seeding involves spraying particles such as silver iodide and salt into clouds from aircraft to trigger rain.

In 2024, Iran announced it had developed its own technology for the practice.

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“We May Have To Evacuate Tehran”: Iranian President’s Remarks Stun Amid Water Crisis

Coming off a very ‘hot’ geopolitical summer which saw Israel and the US attack Tehran and the Islamic Republic’s nuclear energy facilities, Iran is now facing yet another immensely threatening crisis amid historic drought: lack of water for the population of 90+ million.

Rainfall has been at record lows, causing reservoirs to be nearly empty, in an already arid Middle East climate. The situation has grown so acute that President Masoud Pezeshkian has warned that if the drought persists for another month, Tehran’s water would have to be rationed. But this appears to be happening currently, as no rain is expected for at least the next ten days.

Already Iranians are being urged to conserve water and only use what’s available for the most pressing needs. Pezeshkian has actually said something stunning and unprecedented on Monday, though some are describing it as obvious hyperbole: 

“If rationing doesn’t work,” Pezeshkian said, “we may have to evacuate Tehran.“

The alarming statement resulted in an avalanche of criticism in Iranian media, also with former Tehran mayor Gholamhossein Karbaschi dismissing the idea as “a joke” and saying that “evacuating Tehran makes no sense at all”.

Some regional analysts and officials report an over 90% decrease in rainfall compared with last year. The NY Times summarizes of how dire the situation is:

Iran’s officials have begun rationing water in the capital, Tehran, amid a drought so severe that the president has warned the capital may need to be evacuated.

The country is facing the worst drought in six decades, and major dams are at critically low levels. Water authorities this week said the main dams feeding Tehran, on which more than 10 million people depend, were at 5 percent capacity.

On Sunday, the spokesman for Iran’s water industry, Isa Bozorgzadeh, told reporters that water pressure would be lowered from midnight until the morning “so that we can both reduce urban leakage and create an opportunity for city reservoirs to refill.”

People have in some cases taken to TikTok and other social media to show that faucets in their homes have stopped producing water for hours at a time.

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States Go It Alone On ‘Forever Chemicals’ As EPA Delays Federal Action

States are taking action to protect agriculture and waterways from harmful “forever chemicals” as they await federal regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Critics say this has resulted in inconsistent and inadequate regulations exposing much of the country’s soil, air, and water to contamination by the chemicals.

According to the EPA, it is working through a very complex problem concerning a huge category of chemicals.

“The agency is committed to working closely with our partners to take a fresh look at the risks and the tools available to support our rural and agricultural communities on this issue,” the EPA told The Epoch Times in a statement.

At issue are perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). PFAS are a group of more than 14,000 chemicals that have been used in stain- and water-repellent fabrics, nonstick cookware, food packaging, and firefighting foams since the 1940s because of their resistance to heat, oils, stains, grease, and water.

However, they do not degrade naturally and are almost impossible to destroy, earning them the “forever chemicals” appellation. According to the EPA, PFAS have been linked to cancer, reproductive issues, immune disorders, reduced vaccine response, hormonal issues, and weight gain.

In the early part of the 1970s, PFAS chemicals began to show up in soil to which biosolids had been applied.

Dredged as sludge from the bottom of wastewater treatment tanks and treated to reduce or eliminate harmful substances, biosolids have been sold or given to farmers as a low-cost fertilizer for more than 50 years.

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Inside the Texas town where locals are running out of water because huge energy plants are guzzling the supply

Residents of a Texas city are running out of water due to huge energy plants hoarding the supply, according to officials.  

Big name companies, including Exxon Mobil and Tesla, have gone on to call South Texas their home in recent years so they can scoop up cheap energy, land and copious amounts of water. 

Over the past 20 years, the companies have shelled out billions of dollars to build massive plants that use up tons of water to turn fossil fuels into gasoline, and other products like jet fuel. 

And in recent years, these corporations have pushed further with the move to electric vehicles and batteries. In doing so, they refine lithium to make the batteries and produce plastic pellets. 

All of this has severely impacted locals in Corpus Christi, a coastal city about two hours outside of San Antonio. 

An active drought has taken over the area that is home to about more than 500,000.

The city anticipates it won’t be able to meet its water demand within the next 18 months, The Wall Street Journal reported. 

The city’s water supply not only serves the big companies, but is also the source for residents across seven counties. 

And the excess use of water is not only affecting locals, but the companies that guzzle it all away. 

Soon, they could also see a water shortage that could then trickle down to layoffs and a pause in the industry. 

Meanwhile, residents are just trying to do the best they can with what they have while also preparing for the worst. 

Many are trying to financially prepare for booming water prices and also keep their lawns from running dry. 

According to Mike Howard, chief executive of Howard Energy Partners, the water situation ‘is about as dire as I’ve ever seen it.’ 

Howard, who runs a private energy company that owns multiple facilities in the area, said his powerful business can’t even make it through because of the lack of water. 

‘It has all the energy in the world, and it doesn’t have water,’ he said. 

Corpus Christi might not be the only location in the state to be impacted by the drought, as its refineries provide products to markets and regional airports in San Antonio, Austin and Dallas, Texas. 

They also provide supplies to Mexico, as Corpus Christi sits approximately 150 miles from the border.  

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Scientists Discover a New Form of Ice That Shouldn’t Exist

Researchers at the European XFEL and DESY are investigating unusual forms of ice that can exist at room temperature when subjected to extreme pressure.

Ice comes in many forms, even when made of nothing but water molecules. Scientists have now identified more than 20 unique solid structures, or “phases,” of ice, each with its own molecular arrangement. These variations are labeled with Roman numerals, such as ice I, ice II, and ice III.

In a recent breakthrough, an international team of researchers led by scientists from the Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) has discovered a completely new phase known as ice XXI. Using advanced X-ray facilities at the European XFEL and PETRA III, the team captured and analyzed this previously unknown structure. Their findings have been published in Nature Materials.

Ice XXI is unlike any other form of ice observed so far. It develops when liquid water is subjected to rapid compression, creating what scientists call “supercompressed water” at room temperature. This phase is metastable, meaning it can persist for a time even though another type of ice would normally be more stable under the same conditions. The discovery provides valuable new insights into how ice behaves and transforms under extreme pressure.

Water or H2O, despite being composed of just two elements, exhibits remarkable complexity in its solid state. The majority of the phases are observed at high pressures and low temperatures. The team has learned more about how the different ice phases form and change with pressure.

“Rapid compression of water allows it to remain liquid up to higher pressures, where it should have already crystallized to ice VI,” KRISS scientist Geun Woo Lee explains. Ice VI is an especially intriguing phase, thought to be present in the interior of icy moons such as Titan and Ganymede. Its highly distorted structure may allow complex transition pathways that lead to metastable ice phases.

Because most ice variants exist only under extreme conditions, the researchers created high-pressure conditions using diamond anvil cells. The sample – in this case, water – is placed between two diamonds, which can be used to build up very high pressure due to their hardness. Water was examined under pressures of up to two gigapascals, which is about 20,000 times more than normal air pressure. This causes ice to form even at room temperature, but the molecules are much more tightly packed than in normal ice.

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Single US Water Utility Receives 6 Million China-Based Connection Attempts In 1 Week: Security Report

A single water utility in California has received more than 6 million hits from China-based addresses within a week, pointing to the Chinese communist regime’s ongoing efforts to scan for U.S. critical infrastructure vulnerabilities, according to security experts.

The South Coast Water District (SCWD) blocked these connection attempts between July 15 and July 23.

It revealed the figure in a July 23 industry webinar hosted by the Water Information Sharing and Analysis Center, showing a firewall dashboard by security company ThreatSTOP.

SCWD provides potable water, recycled water, and wastewater services to about 40,000 residents, 1,000 businesses, and 2 million visitors annually in Orange County, California.

During the webinar, ThreatSTOP CEO Tom Byrnes and chief scientist Paul Mockapetris, who invented the Domain Name System, advised water industry professionals to tailor who is allowed access to their servers and said that there are some obvious limits one can set.

“If you’re a water district in southern California, you probably don’t have any customers in China,” Mockapetris said.

A ThreatSTOP case study on its website shows that as far back as 2011, even a school district’s network printers in West Memphis, Arkansas, were receiving regular access attempts from China.

Byrnes stated that the 6 million figure had increased overnight from 5 million, demonstrating that critical infrastructure, such as water systems, is constantly being scanned for vulnerabilities.

SCWD’s ThreatSTOP firewall dashboard also showed more than 34,000 blocked connection attempts originating from Bulgaria and more than 21,000 from Iran.

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MIT Invents “Bubble Wrap” That Pulls Fresh Water From The Air…Even In The Driest Places In The World

MIT researchers have invented a new water-harvesting device — a high-tech version of “bubble wrap” — that can pull safe drinking water straight from the air, even in extreme environments like Death Valley, the driest desert in North America, according to LiveScience.

In a study published June 11 in Nature Water, the team described how their innovation could help address global water scarcity. “It works wherever you may find water vapor in the air,” the researchers wrote.

The device is built from hydrogel, a material that can absorb large amounts of water, sandwiched between two glass layers resembling a window. At night, the hydrogel draws moisture from the air. During the day, a special coating on the glass keeps it cool, allowing water to condense and drip into a collection system.

The hydrogel is molded into dome shapes — likened to “a sheet of bubble wrap” — that swell when absorbing moisture. These domes increase surface area, helping the material absorb more water.

LiveScience writes that the system was tested for a week in Death Valley, a region spanning California and Nevada that holds the record as the hottest and driest place in North America.

Despite the harsh conditions, the harvester consistently produced between 57 and 161.5 milliliters of water daily — about a quarter to two-thirds of a cup. In more humid regions, researchers expect even greater yields. According to MIT representatives, this approach outperforms earlier water-from-air technologies and does so without needing electricity.

One major breakthrough was solving a known problem with hydrogel-based water harvesters: lithium salts used to improve absorption often leak into the water, making it unsafe. The new design adds glycerol, which stabilizes the salt and keeps leakage to under 0.06 parts per million — a level the U.S. Geological Survey deems safe for groundwater.

Though a single panel can’t supply an entire household, its small footprint means several can be installed together. The team estimates that eight 3-by-6-foot (1-by-2-meter) panels could provide enough drinking water for a household in areas lacking reliable sources. Compared to the cost of bottled water in the U.S., the system could pay for itself in under a month and remain functional for at least a year.

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Trump blocked Biden-era plan to remove Snake River dams, and he may have prevented an eco-disaster

President Donald Trump issued a memorandum last week blocking an effort that was underway during the Biden-Harris administration to remove four hydroelectric dams in the Snake River. 

Trump’s memorandum revokes a directive from the previous administration, which Trump described as an effort by “radical environmentalism” to raise the “equitable treatment for fish” above that of human flourishing. 

“The negative impacts from these reckless acts, if completed, would be devastating for the region, and there would be no viable approach to replace the low-cost, baseload energy supplied,” Trump stated in the memo. 

If the experiences of those in northern California living along the Klamath River are any indication, Trump is right that a dam-removal project on the Snake River would cause serious and lasting impacts. 

Bad outcomes of dam removal in the past

Last year, four dams near the Klamath River near the Oregon-California border were removed, and people living in communities along the river tell Just the News that the sediment that flooded the river has turned the Klamath into a muddy waterway. While proponents of dam removal say it helps salmon populations, the Klamath River dam removal has decimated fish populations, ruined fishing tourism, and may impact agriculture. 

The worst part, they say, is that all the problems were known long before the removals were carried out. Opponents of the project fought for years to stop it, but the environmentalists who supported the project had more resources and ultimately succeeded in getting what they wanted. 

“We’re a rural community, and we had to have bake sales and auctions to raise money to fight this. And we just didn’t have the funding to be able to fight people coming from all over the globe, essentially, to make this happen,” Richard Marshall, a resident of Fort Jones, California, told Just the News. 

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EPA cancels limits for several PFAS chemicals in drinking water

More than 150 million Americans drink water contaminated with toxic forever chemicals. Last year, after decades of inaction, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) set limits to protect public health. Now, that same agency is undoing those defenses.

Some protections designed to save lives from a dangerous class of chemicals in drinking water are being shut off.

It’s a move being called “devastating” by some experts, including Melanie Benesh, Vice President for Government Affairs at the Environmental Working Group.

“Every time we look at these chemicals, we discover that they are more toxic than we had previously thought,” Benesh said.

She’s been working to protect Americans from PFAS chemicals for years.

Linked to developmental issues in kids, cancer, and reproductive harm, these toxic “forever” chemicals contaminate the water supply from industrial releases, landfills, and firefighting foam.

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