A global geography of rivers in crisis:H d bi di it tiHuman and biodiversity perspectives

Ch l J Vö ö t P l G Charles J. Vörösmarty, Pamela Green, Balázs Fekete….and many colleagues

Opening PlenaryOpening PlenaryGWSP GCI ConferenceBonn GERMANY6 December 2010

Our Mission• The CUNY Environmental Cross-Roads Initiative creates a

j f l i t f t t j i f di l d major focal point for experts to join forces, dialogue, and jointly solve the major 21st century strategic environmental challenges facing the region, the Nation, the world.

The Initiative develops practical strategies for managing an Earth strategies for managing an Earth system capable of sustaining humans and nature over a millennial time horizonmillennial time horizon.

Goals for This DiscussionGoals for This Discussion• Describe chief forces shaping the • Describe chief forces shaping the contemporary and future water systemsp y y

• Discuss a global framework to assess Threats from two perspectives: human water security and aquatic biodiversityhuman water security and aquatic biodiversity

• Present key findings and implicationsPresent key findings and implications

21st-Century Water Systems Hydrology or Hydraulic Engineering?Hydrology or Hydraulic Engineering?

“Water…a profoundly

“Engineered”water

Sanitation & access to clean water

p ylocal resource”M. Muller (21 Sept.09)

Water fordevelopmentp

Agriculture and WaterUrban waters

Agriculture and Water

Water quality

Climate change and its extremes Ecosystem services

Yes! But…..

Withdrawals N Pollution

Large Dams Invasives

Inland FishingHuman Uses and Pressures on H O Pressures on H2O Global & Growing

From: Strayer and Dudgeon (2010), J-NABS

CENTRAL TENET OF THE GWSPHumans are changing the global water

CENTRAL TENET OF THE GWSP

system in a globally-significant way

without adequate knowledge of thewithout…..adequate knowledge of the system and thus its response to change

• Climate Change only part of our water part of our water resource worries

• Population growth and economic development panother critical issue

Vörösmarty, Levy, et al. --Recent work reported to National Intelligence Council

Can we capture the pfull dimensionality of this issue & move from a local to a fully global perspective?p p…and thus be on par with

the global climate change g gquestion

Vi it i th t tVisit: www.riverthreat.net

Nature: September 30 issue

Key Partners

• Charles Vörösmarty • Peter McIntyreM k G D id D d• Mark Gessner • David Dudgeon

• Alexander Prusevich • Pamela GreenSt l Glidd St t B• Stanley Glidden • Stuart Bunn

• Caroline Sullivan • Cathy Reidy• Peter Davies

OUTPUTS JUST PUBLISHED:OUTPUTS JUST PUBLISHED:Vörösmarty et al. (2010) “Global threats to human water security and river biodiversity”, Nature (30 Sept. issue)y y ( p )

For more information: <cvorosmarty@ccny.cuny.edu>

• DEFINE WATERSHED STATE BASED ON LOCAL AND RECURSIVE INDICES

• GOOGLE AND OPEN MAP SERVERS

• MAP SYSTEM STATES OVER MULTI-SPACE & TIME SCALES

Major Sources of Threat to I l d W t F ThInland Waters: Four Themes

Watershed Disturbance•Cropland•Imperviousness

Water Resource Development•Small dam density•River network fragmentation

•Livestock density•Wetland disconnectivity

•Consumptive use (loss/supply)•Water crowding (population/supply)•Cropland per unit supply

Pollutants•Soil salinization•Nitrogen loads

•Residency time change (large dams)

Biotic Threatsg•Phosphorus loads•Mercury deposition•Pesticide loads

•Invasion level (non-native fish)•Non-native fish species richness•Catch pressure

•TSS loads•Organic (BOD) loads•Potential for acidification

p•Aquaculture

N = 23 global data fields•Thermal impacts

One Example: Consequences of the Energy MixOne Example: Consequences of the Energy MixHeat Pollution from Thermoelectric Plants and Manufacturing

-- One of 23 Environmental Stress Agents Considered --One of 23 Environmental Stress Agents Considered

Normalized scores: based on Vassolo and Döll (2005)Normalized scores: based on Vassolo and Döll (2005)

Vörösmarty et al. 2010, Nature (vol. 467)

History of US Dam & Reservoir Construction

1800 1900 1950 20001800 1900• 700% increase in

water held by river systems

1950 2000

Stored Runoff

systems

• Several years of residence time change in many

2102550100

Stored Runoff< 2% annual flow basins

• Tripling of river runoff travel times globally (from 20 up to 60100

>100(from 20 up to 60 days)

• Substantial impact on aquaticon aquatic biodiversity

• Interception of 30% of continental TSS flux

Framing Committee/GWSP 2004, Eos AGU Transactions

Hydro-Metrics at the Fully Regional ScaleResidence Time = Stored volume / Q

Stored volume = volume in beaver ponds1, mill ponds1 and reservoirs2 (m3)

Q = surface water flow3 including local and upstream sources (m3/day)

1. Salant, Bain & Brandt 20082 National Inventory of Dams USACE 2005 AQUATIC COMPONENT2. National Inventory of Dams, USACE 20053. Fekete et al 2010

Q

Ecosystem Infrastructure & Services

Tropics

The Mississippi As It Was

Globally: Value and impact of loss of natural flood control and other

i k d thservices are unknown….and they are changing

Threat to Biodiversity

BD Threat score

• Pandemic • Generally correlated to population, agriculture, development• Non-local transboundary and broad transition zones prevail

An Underpinning / Corroboration of BD L ?BD Loss?

• Unusually high concentration of biodiversity: ~125,000 U usua y g co ce t at o o b od e s ty 5,000freshwater species described (~1/3 of known

06km

2

6km

2

Chordatesvertebrate species) despite inland waters <1% of the landmass; high sp

ecie

s/10

spec

ies/

106

Described

the landmass; highendemism…high risk

Des

crib

ed

Impe

riled

s

• Globally 10,000-20,000 freshwater species are From: Strayer and Dudgeon (2010), J-NABS

extinct or imperiled

• Have FW systems moved from the Holocene• Have FW systems moved from the Holocene into the Anthropocene?

Two Views of Planet Earth: ca. 2000

Why so different?

More People, More Development, Means More Water EngineeringMeans More Water Engineering

• Widespread hydrological alterations arising fromarising from– Irrigation– Dams and Reservoirs– Interbasin Transfer/Flow Diversion

• Benefits & concerns: Among these aret i i i t’l b iresource asymmetries in int’l basins

• These are costly supply-side solutions to water scarcityy

Asymmetries in the Capacity to Control the ResourceInfrastructure gap: Reservoir water storageInfrastructure gap: Reservoir water storage

Water storage per person (m3)

6,1506 0007,000

g p p ( )

3 255

4,729

4,0005,0006,000

7461,287 1,406

2,4863,255

2,0003,000,

43746

01,000

opia

uth ca and

os na azil

alia

th ica

Eth

io

Sou

Afri

Thai

l a La Chi Bra

Aus

tra

Nor

tA

mer

i

Asymmetry in Provision of Clean Water & Sanitation: A Millennium Development Imperative & Destabilizing Forcep p g

Almost 1 Bn lack cleanAlmost 1 Bn lack clean drinking water

Over Bn people lackOver Bn people lack basic sanitation

• 1.7M deaths from water-related diarrheal diseaserelated diarrheal disease

• $100B? globally from health costs and decreased productivity

• Political not technical f il t ifailure..no esoteric technology needed

WHO/UNICEF 2004, 2010

Two Views of Planet Earth: ca. 2000Large $$ & Energy Costs• Treat symptoms rather (Like BD) y p

than causes• Strand poor & BD under

high levels of threat

Point-of-service solutionsbenefit rich countries

high levels of threat• Water management

impacts (like from dams) impair BD and impair BD and Ecosystem Services

Infrastructure investments are huge: $0.75Trillion/yr for OECD & BRIC alone by 2015

Why so different?

Humans InteractingInteracting w/ the Global Water Cycle--

The Picture TodayThe Picture Today

High resolution mapping shows ca. 20% population w/ no access t bl t

•Importance of upstream source

to renewable water supply

•Importance of upstream source areas: note Amazon/S. Asian contrast

•Notion of tradeoffs w/in basinVörösmarty et al. (2005), Millennium Assessment,

Conditions & TrendsWorking Group •

THREAT TO FRESH WATER

• Relative scoring• Expert weightingsp g g• Distinct perspectives for Human Water Security (HWS) and

Calculation Strategy

Biodiversity (BD) Threat (e.g. dams for HWS but for BD)• Beneficiary investments inCalculation Strategy

• Conjoin classes of threatthrough consensus-based

i hti (0 1)

Beneficiary investments in water-related infrastructure and services recognized for HWS*

weightings (0-1)

T k = Wjkω j, i

k Dik

i =1

Nj

∑j =1

5

∑-Flow stabilization-Access to river corridors-Clean drinking water

• 4 Themes• 23 within-Theme Drivers• Threat routed through

g

*Likely to be in the Trillions of USDThreat routed through

networks, normalized

Desert Locustppl/km2 ha/ppl

World 51.2 1.96

Urban 943.9 0.11

Urban + Cultivated 350.2 0.29

Australia 2.8 36.1

Bangladesh 1083.7 0.09

European Union 113 7 0 88European Union 113.7 0.88

Hungary 106.5 0.94

India 351.9 0.26

Japan 336.3 0.30

The Netherlands 402.4 0.25

United States 31.2 2.98

Swarm size: 1200 km2

Density: 40-80×106 llt/km2

Weight: 2g htt // i l ti l hi / i l /b /l t ht l

Desert Locust Swarm 1100.0 0.09

26

Weight: 2g http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/bugs/locust.html

Energy UseEnergy UseW/capita

Bangladesh 214Eritrea 265Senegal 310gBrazil 1422China 1516Chile 2200Chile 2200Lebanon 2264Romania 2376C 4370Cyprus 4370Kazakhstan 4474United States 10381Luxemburg 12531Iceland 15606Qatar 28495

27

Energy Use DistributionEnergy Use Distribution

28

More Just Energy DistributionMore Just Energy Distribution

29

In ConclusionCo c us o• Pandemic fingerprint of human-induced impacts on

water systems l l ff t t l b l dwater systems…local effects move to global syndromes

• Both Human Water Security (HWS) and Biodiversity (BD) hi h l l f i id Th t(BD) at high levels of incident Threat…likely to persist into the future

• Engineering interventions reduce Threat to HWS in developed world….”stranding” developing world HWS and l b l BD i t t f hi h l ti Th tglobal BD in state of high relative Threat

• IWRM and “soft path” alternatives can spare the developing world the costly (in $$ & environmental terms) strategy of treating symptoms and not causes

• Frameworks like RIMS useful in IPBES context

Some References Vö ö t C J P B M I t M O G D D d A P i h P G S Glidd S E B C A • Vörösmarty, C.J., P. B. McIntyre, M. O. Gessner, D. Dudgeon, A. Prusevich, P. Green, S. Glidden, S. E. Bunn, C. A.

Sullivan, C. Reidy Liermann & P. M. Davies (2010). Global threats to human water security and river biodiversity. Nature (in press).

• Ericson, J.P., C.J. Vörösmarty, S.L. Dingman, L.G. Ward, and M. Meybeck (2006). Effective sea-level rise in deltas: sources of change and human-dimension implications. Global & Planetary Change 50: 63-82.

• Fekete, B.M., J.A. Gibson, P. Aggarwal, and C.J. Vörösmarty (2006). Application of isotope tracers in continental scale hydrological modeling. Journal of Hydrology 330- 444-56.

• Vörösmarty C J (2002) Global water assessment and potential contributions from earth systems science Aquatic Vörösmarty, C.J. (2002). Global water assessment and potential contributions from earth systems science. Aquatic Sciences 64: 328-351.

• Vörösmarty, C.J., D. Lettenmaier, C. Leveque, M. Meybeck, C. Pahl-Wostl, J. Alcamo, W. Cosgrove, H. Grassl, H. Hoff, P. Kabat, F. Lansigan, R. Lawford, R. Naiman (2004). Humans transforming the global water system. Eos AGU Transactions 85: 509 513 1485: 509, 513-14.

• Meybeck, M. and C.J. Vörösmarty, editors (2004). The integrity of river and drainage basin systems: Challenges from environmental change. Section D in: P. Kabat, M. Claussen, P.A. Dirmeyer, J.H.C. Gash, L. Bravo de Guenni, M. Meybeck, R.A. Pielke Sr., C.J. Vörösmarty, R.W.A. Hutjes, and S. Lutkemeier (eds.), Vegetation, Water, Humans and the Cli t S i H id lb 566 Climate. Springer, Heidelberg. 566 pp.

• Vörösmarty, C.J., C. Leveque, C. Revenga (Convening Lead Authors) (2005). Chapter 7: Fresh Water. In: Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, Volume 1: Conditions and Trends Working Group Report, (with R. Bos, C. Caudill, J. Chilton, E. M. Douglas, M. Meybeck, D. Prager, P. Balvanera, S. Barker, M. Maas, C. Nilsson, T. Oki, C. A. Reidy), pp. 165-207. Island Press. 966 pp.

• Vörösmarty, C.J., E.M. Douglas, P.A. Green, and C. Revenga (2005). Geospatial indicators of emerging water stress: An application to Africa. Ambio. 34: 230-236.

• Vörösmarty, C.J. 2008. Water for a crowded planet: An emerging global challenge for Earth system science and technology. Vörösmarty, C.J. 2008. Water for a crowded planet: An emerging global challenge for Earth system science and technology. Water for A Changing World Enhancing Local Knowledge and Capacity. Taylor and Francis, London.

• Wollheim, W.M., C.J. Vörösmarty, B.J. Peterson, S.P. Seitzinger, and C.S. Hopkinson (2006). Relationship between river size and nutrient removal. Geophysical Research Letters 33: doi:10.1029 / 2006GL025845.