India’s reservoirs lose more water each year due to climate change

In recent years, major droughts have emptied rivers, reservoirs and groundwater reserves in large parts of India. This situation has pushed the country's polluted and leaking water systems to the limit. The volume of water loss by evaporation from these water bodies in the country increased at a rate of 5.9 percent per decade between 1985 and 2018, and the factors driving this decline are influenced by man-made global warming.

More than 600 million Indians suffer from "acute water shortages," according to a report last summer by NITI Aayog, a leading government think tank. 70% of the country's water supply is contaminated, causing some 200,000 deaths a year. Some 21 cities could run out of groundwater next few years, including Bangalore and New Delhi, according to this report. By 2030, 40% of the Indian population (more than 500 million people) "will not have access to clean water".

From time to time, India receives more water than it needs. But the vast majority of rain falls during the summer monsoon season, usually over the course of four months. Another main source of water for the country is the melting of snow and glaciers from the Himalayan plateau, which fills the rivers in the north.

The World Report on Water Development of the United Nations, 2015, indicates that, by the year 2030, it will only be possible to cover with existing resources at the current rate of use, 60% of the global demand for water.

Farmers without efficient irrigation systems use electricity (which is heavily subsidized) to extract as much groundwater as they can. Agriculture is the largest water-consuming sector in India, using over 80% of the supply, despite only accounting for around 15% of the country's GDP.

Climate change will surely make the situation worse. A paper published last year in Geophysical Research Letters found that flash flooding will increase significantly in 78 of 89 urban areas analyzed if global temperatures rise 2°C above pre-industrial levels. The resulting catastrophes will disproportionately harm the nation's poor, as they often settle along the floodplains of major cities.

In India, Transboundary Rivers such as the Ganges, the Indus and the Brahmaputra, central to the development of the region, have been/are under great pressure due to population growth, industrial development, the phenomenon of urbanization and environmental pollution.

The situation is aggravated when considering the greater variability of rainfall and weather patterns that make the region highly susceptible to floods, droughts and natural disasters. In addition, within the framework of a highly securitized approach to the water issue,

In addition, India is currently facing a water crisis, far greater than any it has ever had to deal with before. All of its watercourses, within and near population centers, are heavily polluted with various pollutants.

In fact, in 2017 a modification was made to the original regulations, which regulate these litigations, which date back to 1956.

According to WRI's Projected Water Stress Country Rankings, water stress, the imbalance between water demand and supply, is getting worse in India due to population growth, increased use of water for agriculture and industry and decreased rainfall due to climate change. Projections show that more than two-thirds of the nation's power plants will face high water stress by the end of the decade.

Globally, the situation will worsen, with projections showing that the number of people affected by floods will double between 2010 and 2030, due to climate change, population growth, development and land subsidence. The most recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects that the global alert will further intensify the variability of the water cycle, monsoon rainfall and the severity of extreme dry and wet.

Ultimately, for India's rapidly developing society, power outages caused by floods or drought affect people's livelihoods and their ability to work, study or receive medical care, multiplying the impacts of extreme weather events related to water.