Dead Sea drying at an alarming rate

A new study by Shahrazad Abu Ghazleh and colleagues from the University of Technology in Darmstadt, Germany has indicated that the water levels in the Dead Sea, which is the deepest point on Earth, are dropping at an alarming rate with serious environmental consequence. In the case of the Dead Sea, the change in water level is due to intensive human water consumption from the Jordan and Yarmouk Rivers for irrigation, as well as the use of Dead Sea water for the potash industry by both Israel and Jordan.

The researchers point out that this rapid drop in the level of the Dead Sea has a number of detrimental consequences, including higher pumping costs for the factories using the Dead Sea to extract potash, salt and magnesium. They also include an accelerated outflow of fresh water from surrounding underground water aquifers; receding shorelines making it difficult for tourists to access the water for medicinal purposes; and the creation of a treacherous landscape of sinkholes and mud as a result of the dissolution of buried salt, which causes severe damage to roads and civil engineering structures.

Courtesy - Zeenews