'Water mining' is now a prime culprit for raising sea levels (irrigation is killing us all alert)

London Daily Telegraph ^ | October 9, 2010 | Geoffrey Lean

[eyedigress]

Thank God every building on the planet wasn’t heated by COAL 140 years ago. Whew, it would really be moonbat nuts.

[SteamShovel]

The water from burning fossil fuels certainly isn't replenishing deepwater aquifers faster than they are being drained.

I didn't say it did. I am only pointing out that this is something the greenies have never acknowledged.

I am also surprised somebody hasn't "raised the alarm" suggesting fossil fuels are depleting our oxygen supply. (not that I believe this would be a problem)

[sionnsar]

This is so absurd to be passed off as scientific reasoning that it borders on mental illness.

It doesn't "border on" -- it IS.

[UnbelievingScumOnTheOtherSide]

Move to a CONTINENT.

[fella]

According to the Global-Warming-Nazi’s orriginal predictions from back in the late 80’s shouldn’t the oceans already have risen over these islands ? And why haven’t they contacted the Dutch about building dikes around their islands?

[Strategerist]

Just did some back-of-the-envelope calculations.

1) Total groundwater used for irrigation is estimated at 545 cubic kilometers per year.

http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci-discuss.net/7/3977/2010/hessd-7-3977-2010.pdf

2) Couldn’t find a good source but I’ll ballpark 33% of that usage as “fossil” water from deep aquifers that don’t or barely recharge, leaving 180 km3.

3) Total surface area of the ocean is 361,000,000 square kilometers. Tiny fractions of the mined water end up as glaciers, ice sheets, in lakes, or in surface groundwater, but the overwhelming majority ends up in the ocean.

4) The resulting addition ends up raising sea level by half a millimeter/year; this is 2 inches over 100 years.

5) The 100 year average of yearly sea-level rise is 1.8mm/yr.

6) Yes, that can actually be measured.

7) This indicates that fossil water usage could be a significant component of the (tiny) sea level rises that are occuring.

[bill1952]

Nowhere in the Maldives juts more than 10 feet above the Indian Ocean, making it...

a place where humans should not live?

[epithermal]

Excellent points, thanks for taking the time to write them. I also tried to find the article referred to by the author, but had no luck. The one you refer to has to do with the GRACE satellites, so I am not sure if it is related to ground water. Grace website: http://www.csr.utexas.edu/grace/

I am not a member of AGU, so I can’t access the article, but it will probably show up online in other news soon. I am going to keep looking because I would like to see the basis for the argument.

I see that people are having fun with the term ‘water mining’, but it is an old accepted term used by groundwater hydrologists and is a fact. We have an area here in Washington state where declining water levels have become extreme and there is a lot of talk about artificial recharge by the government.

[epithermal]

I was looking at the GRACE site and found this:

“Data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) helps scientists monitor changes in water storage over large areas as illustrated on the front of this lithograph. Gravity changes correspond to mass changes and scientists can isolate the portion of the total mass change caused by the movement of water. Hydrologists go a step further and combine information from GRACE with soil moisture and other data to isolate changes in groundwater storage, allowing them to monitor monthly water storage changes in aquifers.”

From: http://www.csr.utexas.edu/grace/publications/water_litho.pdf

So maybe the GRL article on GRACE is the one. I have had quite a bit of experience with gravity data, so I am interested to know how they arrive at groundwater storage. I know the USGS has done some microgravity experiments to look at groundwater storage in restricted areas.

[bill1952]

Well, some might also postulate that an endless preoccupation of such minute changes over long amounts of time even while those changes will also undoubtedly be changed on a more or less regular basis, along with the concomitant changes and reversals of extrapolated results, is a valid diagnosis of OCD, and that is a mental disorder.

just saying...

[ErnBatavia]

Ack....Fat Albert looks like he’s developed sudden-onset Down Syndrome.

[lewislynn]

Global warming, water uses, aquifers, rising seas aside. The article suggests that irrigation water evaporates, then comes down as rain on the oceans causing rising sea levels...as if ocean water DOES NOT evaporate and come down on land.

The way I see it you also believe that to be true.

I guess all the runoff from rivers to the ocean is insignificant compared to irrigation water. Using your/their rising sea logic. At the rate of yearly river water runoff for centuries Phoenix should be beach front property.

[barb-tex]

All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again. Eccl 1:7 (KJV).
Its not aur fault even if the sea level was rising, which it it ien’t; We have to be causing something or you will be out of Business, Al.

[combat_boots]

I wonder what the ecofascists will use to explain the creation of land mass with volcanos. Self-fertilization? Strategic verticals?