Activity 2.2 - Hydrosphere: Lake Chad, Africa

Shrinking Lake Chad


 Original Photo of Lake Chad circa 1973

Lake Chad in 1973, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/2065 (Jones, 2023)


Second Photo of Lake Chad circa 1987

Lake Chad in 1987, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/2065 (Jones, 2023)


Google Earth View 2023

(Google Earth, 6/2023)


Lake Chad, Chad, Africa, 1973 - present


Problem 

Previously the sixth largest lake in the world (earthkam.org), Lake Chad has shrunk dramatically since the 1960’s to a tenth of its size and a fraction of its depth. The continual decline of Lake Chad has dire implications for the tens of millions of people and countless animals that rely on it to live; from less drinking water and water for food crops and farm animals, to potentially diminishing biodiversity in and around the lake, the effects are numerous and don’t appear to be improving in spite of efforts to replenish the lake. From the photos above we can see that the lake is gradually disappearing and might one day dry up entirely if nothing can be done to stop the process.




Explanation 

Although the lake has always been sourced by rainfall and the local rivers, human activity and climate change are affecting the lake’s water levels and preventing it from refilling at a sustainable rate. It might be surprising to some to learn that something happening in Greenland can affect communities in Africa, but research and experiments suggest that freshwater runoff into the ocean from Greenland could be affecting water temperatures in the North Atlantic (specifically, increasing the temperature) which has affected Earth’s hydrosphere by way of reduced rainfall in certain areas, including the Sahel and Sahara regions of Africa where Lake Chad is located (Pham-Duc et al., 2020). The effect of course results in less rainfall directly into the lake itself, but also less water for the Chari, Logone, and Komadugu-Yobe rivers, which supply Lake Chad. 


Climate change is a major contributor to the shrinking lake, but the situation is exacerbated by direct human activities in the region. Agricultural needs have driven people to rely heavily on Lake Chad, but poor resource management and unsustainable irrigation practices have allowed portions of the lake bed to remain dry, resulting in the growth of vegetation, including some invasive plant species such as prosopis (https://en.unesco.org/). 





References


"BIOsphere and Heritage of Lake Chad (BIOPALT) project." unesco.org, en.unesco.org/biopalt/landscapes#:~:text=The%20most%20common%20trees%20on,of%20firewood%2C%20fuelwood%20and%20coal.


"Introduction to Lake Chad." Sally Ride EarthKAM @ Space Camp, www.earthkam.org/ek-images/investigating_images/chad.


Jones, Joycelyn T., and Michael Coe. "Lake Chad in 1973" and "Lake Chad in 1987". 2023, NASA, Washington, DC. en.unesco.org/biopalt/landscapes#:~:text=The%20most%20common%20trees%20on,of%20firewood%2C%20fuelwood%20and%20coal.. Accessed 13 Sept. 2023.


"The Lake Chad hydrology under current climate change." Nature.com Scientific Reports, edited by Binh Pham-Duc, Florence Sylvestre, Fabrice Papa, Frederic Frappart, and Camille Bouchez, 26 Mar. 2020, www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-62417-w.

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