MAY 20

I drink it up!

that is... so horrible, I don't know what to say, I just hope people can open their eyes and see how we affect the world and prevent other water-sources from suffering this fate, or at least suffer anymore...

By Tom Bissell - a fascinating book on the author's trek through Uzbekistan towards the Aral sea, I couldn't put it down. It details the whys of the sea's disappearance, but also the human devastation left by the politics of water (among other things) in the region. The photo on the cover is a ship's skeleton in the midst of a desert, abandoned by the shrinking sea. The people who live on the "seashore" have lost their livelihood, and have only polluted salt water to drink.

I challenge anyone to find a crop that has caused more human misery than cotton. Water intensive and until recently labour intensive as well. Anyone who says democracies are too slow to save the environment needs to look at the devastation left in the wake of Communism.

Hank I think the phrase you are looking for but your blindness made you miss the objective report is the following.

"Next time some nutjob tells you that humanity is too insignificant to really CHANGE the environment in significant ways, just send them to this page."

Because that's some change.

but where is the rest of the story talking about the jobs, and eco system created the additional 0xygen pumped in the system because of the plants that are grown? Oh that's right you have an "agenda" so results of "change" only matter if it is inline with what you believe.

I'm not saying what was done is right or wrong. I'm just saying you have an agenda and are not interested in the whole truth/picture.

While some countries need to divert water to support their populace, it is the short sightedness that is the biggest threat to the planet. We often do the quick and easy thing to solve a problem, rather than look at the long term ramifications. They may have managed to create a cotton industry, but created a whole new population of poor and unemployed. It happens across the board-look at our pursuit of biofuels at the expense of the food chain. The use of corn as a bio fuel has led to soaring food prices and the poor suffer most.

I'm glad for many human inventions that better our lives. Yes, humans can make changes to their environments that benifit mankind. We can make these changes with the environment in mind, to lessen and hopefully eliminate our negative effect on it.

But, somehow, destroying an entire sea does not seem a positive change on the environment. As an realistic environmentalist, I don't think we should get rid of all cars and live in huts. I think we should work WITH the environment, so we don't disturb the natural balance. Destroying a sea is plainly working AGAINST the environment. Change can be good...eliminating a sea destroys the livelyhood of many people. Even if you don't mention the effect it has on the local and global environment, which in turn effects everyone, it is not a good change. Technology can be used for good or bad. To shrink a sea down to absolutly nothing over a period of less than a decade is a negative change--a destructive change. So yes, humans can hurt the environment. Hank is not "blind", he's realistic. It's time we all learned to think and see what is plainly right before our eyes.

Try this fun experiement:

Great salt lake: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=...de=&q=aral sea&mrt=all

Zoom to the 2-mi scale, then zoom in to the 1-mi scale. These satellite photos were taken in different years. Magic Disappearing lake!

...oops. Here's the correct link:
http://is.gd/C4pM

Do you think the cotton crop offset the effectiveness of the sea as a carbon sink? You are assuming that there was zero life in the sea that would absorb CO2. The oceans are the worlds largest carbon sinks, and I'm sure it stands to reason that the Aral sea was functioning in some capacity as a carbon sink. Plus, there's no way in hell cotton would be grown purely to absorb carbon and add to the biomass when there are many more efficient crops.

Actually it's CO2's solubility in saltwater that makes it a good carbon sink. Check the interwebs...

This looks very very serious. Governments! Its about time you all got your acts right. At least some countries are putting in effort to be a lot more green.
http://walydopts.blogspot.com/...ming.html
http://walydopts.blogspot.com/2009/05/frozen-killers-in-antartic.html

Why hasn't anyone mentioned Hemp as one of the well known alternative to cotton? It requires far less effort to grow. It's much durable, and can be grown packed in tight spaces. Anyway, we need to find ways to use water more sparingly. And question if it's worth its long term effect. I agree that diverting water from Aral sea was a bad idea.

Pretty impressive, but not in a good way. I think this highlights how much of an impact we really do have on the environment.

If this is not an impressive example of how much human activity can impact nature, I don't know what is...

You people are hilarious.

Terrible as this is for local residents, major ecological events are measured on a timeline of many millions of years, not 10, not 100, not even 100,000 (the rise of modern man). Fissures in the earth's surface have released billions of gallons of oil, volcanic eruptions have filled the atmosphere with noxious gases and forest fires have occurred naturally since the formation of this planet. The "we're destroying the earth" dialog is very egotistical because it assumes that humans will have any lasting affect on a planet once we're gone.

I'm not saying ecological conversation and protection is a pointless goal, we can certainly take steps to ensure that our near term environment is conserved for our own good. On a long enough timeline, though, none of that will matter.

The Easter Islanders destroyed their ecosystem for much the same reasons as the Russians have destroyed the Aral Sea, and themselves along with it. Easter Island's demise took a little longer, about a century, but when it collapsed, it went fast. The Aral Sea and the communities that depend on it are about to do the same. Can we fix it? Probably not. Can we prevent the same thing happening elsewhere? Most certainly.

Listen newfags, STFU with your CO2 BS. Russia sucks. If they didn't destroy their ecosystem with cotton, then it would only be a matter of time before flesh eating zombies took over.
ZZZZZOMMMGGGGG!!!

Sadly it looks more like the Aral Puddle than the Aral Sea :'(

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Its odd that Google Earth's view which claims pictures from 2009, show a large northern and southern lake. The water is still there according to Google...?

i agree with jake that we can not destroy the planet. life on earth will eventually recover from whatever we do to it, even if it takes millions of years. but we are definitely on a path that will damage it enough to cause our own extinction

i believe that environmentalism is really about self-preservation. its about maintaining the biosphere so that it will continue to support the human race. we are becoming more and more aware of what is necessary to achieve this goal, but there is still a lot to learn. i believe that conservation and resource management should be pursued aggressively for our own survival, any other issues that human societies faces right now are trivial in comparison, because none of it will matter if our species is extinct.

Other series of images taken over the last ten years show deforestation in South America, urbanization in Dubai, and the water level in Lake Powell

Is there any hope for the recovery of these and other lakes that have been rapidly depleting over the years?

I am glad to talk with you and you give me great help! Thanks for that,I am wonderring if I can contact you via email when I meet problems.

Thank you very much. I am wonderring if I can share your article in the bookmarks of society,Then more friends can talk about this problem.

Impressive photos. I have never read elsewhere about those dramatic changes of this sea.

Pretty good post. I just found your site and wanted to say that I have really enjoyed browsing your posts. In any case I’ll be subscribing to your blog and I hope you post again soon!

water for irrigation is a necessary one , but at the same time why don't people think bout the consequence of their options or ideas (however they term it). and moreover in a public project like this , i feel its necessary to think on the impact of the solutions which they are opting...........

The colorado river, was tamed by the Hover dam,
and other dams around it, now almost no water runs to the ocean, besides the killing the of the fish of the river and massive loss of cooling to the ocean (global warming comes from where warming waters, suprise)?, certainly other changes to the environment have occured, sorry in google earth you cannot see what is left of the river flowing to the ocean, it is fogged out.

by 2015 nothing will be left

In reply to yellowlab; the disappearance of the sea is not a change, it's a disaster. The area around the sea was also used for industrial development, and many of the waste products ended up in the sea. The areas which have dried up are now toxic dustbowls, there are very few plants growing. When the wind blows the dust is picked up and spread around the the neighbouring disticts, where it poisons the remaining agriculture.
Local inhabitants are experiencing large increases in many diseases as a result.
The Kazkhstan government together with several international agencies have initiated a recovery program; the first step was the construction of a barrage across the Northen part of the sea and an overhaul of the irrigation systems in order to absorb less of the water flow from the rivers. The result is that the Kazak section of the sea has started to refill and overflow water is beginning to enter the Southern section. Unfortunately the nations bordering the Southern sections of the sea are unable to afford the measures to speed up the process. The images on Google earth are out of date, you need to look elsewhere for the current picture.

Some folks wonder if any animals are harmed during the making of Ugg Boots. The short answer is, the sheep is slaughtered. BUT, that sheep was going to be slaughtered for meat to feed people—it is never actually slaughtered to obtain the sheepskin. Sheep farmers obtain a secondary profit for selling the hides in addition to the meat.

Of all the people that DIDN'T drown in the lake because it shrank! Thank you Russia for all the lives you saved

Beaners.

wow those pictures show the water going away quick, now that is scary stuff!

.But I'm glad to see that you finally enabled comments on here, although I doubt everyone will be 'nice' for long... see

We have done much the same thing here in the U.S. with regards to the Colorado River, every drop of which is now diverted for drinking or agriculture. It's sad that we don't fully account for the impact of altering nature to 'our benefit'.

California residents and politicians should be sent copies of these photos. Water that they presume to be plentiful (and clean) may be here today and gone tomorrow if they keep mis-using and mis-pricing it.