NASA Satellites Reveal Continents Are Getting Drier as Fresh Water Has Dropped Significantly in the Last Decade

NASA satellites have an update about continents, and it isn't optimistic. According to the data gathered by the space agency's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites, Earth's freshwater content has dropped significantly over the last decade, Space reported.

Researchers compared the situation in 2014 to today and concluded that at present, the planet is going through a drier phase than normal. Findings associated with this phenomenon have been published in the journal Surveys in Geophysics.

As per the study, satellite readings have uncovered that the average amount of freshwater stored on Earth from 2015 to 2023 was 290 cubic miles (1,200 cubic kilometers). This quantity was significantly lower than what was recorded from 2002 to 2014. Researchers noted that several unique phenomena took place on Earth during this period that could have led the continents to their present state.

One of the first things researchers observed was that the decline started with a drought in northern and central Brazil, which was later followed by a series of droughts in different parts of the world. They further added that 13 of the 30 most powerful droughts across the globe have struck Earth since January 2015. 

Another major phenomenon that happened during this dry spell, was the tropical Pacific Ocean turning warmer than normal, from late 2014 into 2016. This change brought forth a huge El Niño event that altered weather and rainfall patterns around the world. There was a huge loss in terms of water content during this time, from which Earth reportedly never bounced back.

Researchers believe that all of these changes could have been caused by increasing levels of global warming throughout the decade, Space reported. Michael Bosilovich, a meteorologist at NASA Goddard stated that persistent high temperatures do not allow freshwater reservoirs to get replenished.

"Global warming leads the atmosphere to hold more water vapor, which results in more extreme precipitation," he explained. "The problem when you have extreme precipitation is the water ends up running off instead of soaking in and replenishing groundwater stores. Warming temperatures increase both the evaporation of water from the surface to the atmosphere, and the water-holding capacity of the atmosphere, increasing the frequency and intensity of drought conditions."

Some experts though are against the correlation of increasing global warming levels and depleting water content, Space reported. They believe that other factors could be in play for this dry phase, and should be explored. "There are uncertainties in climate predictions; measurements and models always come with errors," Susanna Werth, a hydrologist and remote sensing scientist at Virginia Tech not affiliated with the study stated.

Researchers associated with the study though are firm in identifying global warming as the main culprit and believe that more dry days are in the future.