Cyprus is running out of water

Climate change and a rising population in the region are lending to a drought that is now at crisis stage in Cyprus. I find it very hard to comprehend why so many people do not take this seriously. Water is the mainstay of our lives. Without it we die. The people of Cyprus and actually the entire Mediterranean area are now seeing rising temperatures with less water due to water evaporation due to global warming/climate change and a rising population. It is now changing the very way farmers and others there live.

This is now a global crisis that must be addressed along with the climate crisis. We cannot continue to take water for granted and expect it will be there when we need it. For the people of Cyprus as well as people in Australia, Asia, Africa, South America, and now North America, this is just a foretaste of what is to come if we do not get serious about water conservation, more efficient irrigation, and cutting Co2 emissions.

And there are many who would not fight over oil, but any of us pushed to our limit would fight for water to survive. I know I would. This will be a great test of moral will and humanity. There is not one continent besides Antarctica (which is melting) that has not been hit by drought in some form or other... that is not just a natural fluke. Also, if we keep polluting the freshwater that is left while population increases, we are only pushing ourselves that much closer to extinction, and I truly do not believe that is 'shrill' any longer.

Entries on this blog concern droughts in Spain, Italy, China, Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa, India, the US, South America, Southeast Asia, Australia, the Mediterranean... this is a global crisis with global ramifications due to political corruption, lack of political and moral will, corporatization of freshwater sources in an attempt to commoditize a scarce resource for profit, major pollution, glacier melt, climate change, political apathy, human apathy, mismanagement of resources, old and decaying infrastructure that wastes water, wasteful irrigation practices (wastes about 70% of water globally)... and on and on and on... but instead of people learning from examples like Cyprus and Australia, we continue the same wasteful behavior thinking that water will always be there for us when we need it... and of course, thinking 'desalination' will be a savior when it is merely just a bandaid.

It is interesting to me to observe the human species and our way of always trying to find short cuts to never have to do anything to change our own behavior and comfortable lifestyles thinking that any change will ultimately threaten that. Instead we think we can simply continue to waste and pollute this resource and then take it from the sea... to do what exactly? Then run the seas dry as we continue to not face the 400 lb gorilla in the room: population?

Well, people have been warned on this just like they were regarding global warming/climate change, and it seems all people on the whole wish to do is read it and move on... So when Monsanto, Nestle, and other multinationals own all of the water in the global market thus stripping any human rights to water as well as our food then I suppose that is when we will see the showdown... or when climate change completely destroys our eco systems... or when a catastrophic event occurs to try to rouse us into our senses... only, by then it may just well be too damn late.

In the case of Limassol, Cyprus. their reservoirs are empty and they must now depend upon Greece for tankers to supply their water...which I do not believe is very clean regardless of what is reported. Greece is also a country already feeling the effects of drought and desertification as well. This now also has political repercussions as the Greek South and Turkish North both go without the water they need as desertificaiton spreads. As water becomes scarcer desalination is now the option, only dessalination is expensive, harmful to marine life, and energy intensive, thus perpetuating the very atmosphere that lent to the drought in the first place. However, now it is the only choice in a place where climate change is making itself known firsthand.

And what happens when the Turkish North which has the same problems protest that Greece is only selling water to the Greek South as desertification continues to creep Northward? A war over water?

Both sides working on solutions to Cyprus drought

On the other hand, perhaps this severe drought will transcend political divisions to bring peace to the people of Cyprus working for a common solution to a moral crisis. We can only hope, and hope that a solution for these people comes soon.