Drying lakes and thirsty trees: In drought-hit Greece, water trucks are keeping crops alive

The dried retired Lake Picrolimni is seen from above, adjacent the colony of Mikrokampos, bluish Greece, August 19. A terrible drought successful bluish Greece, worsened by successive heatwaves and debased rainfall, is causing h2o shortages that are threatening agriculture, drying up lakes, and stressing section communities babelike connected tourism. [Giannis Papanikos/AP]

NEA SILATA – Six weeks earlier harvest, there’s nary h2o near successful the crushed for husbandman Dimitris Papadakis’ olive grove successful bluish Greece, truthful helium has started a caller greeting routine.

Joined by his teenage son, helium uses a motortruck to bring h2o from adjacent areas. Using a tiny generator, helium connects the conveyance to irrigation pipes to prevention what’s near of his thirsty crop.

“Our boreholes person astir dried up … We present beryllium connected tankers to irrigate our fields,” says Papadakis, who heads an cultivation cooperative successful a colony successful Halkidiki, a three-fingered peninsula successful bluish Greece which is fashionable with tourists.

This summer, confederate Europe has been hammered by successive vigor waves, pursuing connected from below-average rainfall for up to 3 years. Drought spots connected the representation of the portion person expanded. In Greece, the effects see h2o shortages, dried-up lakes, and adjacent the decease of chaotic horses.

The groundwater beneath Papadakis’ 270 olive trees is dwindling and becoming brackish, with the drought expected to chopped his expected output successful half.

The h2o situation has been exacerbated by a booming tourer season.

In Kassandra, the westernmost digit of the peninsula, the year-round colonisation of 17,000 swells to 650,000 successful the summer, placing unsustainable unit connected h2o resources.

“We’ve seen a 30-40% simplification successful h2o proviso pursuing 3 consecutive winters with astir nary rainfall,” says section politician Anastasia Halkia.

Haroula Psaropoulou owns a location successful the area, successful the seaside colony of Nea Potidea. She says it’s hard to header with predominant household h2o cuts that whitethorn past up to 5 days during the searing heat.

“I recycle h2o from the bath descend and from washing, and I usage it for the plants,” the 60-year-old Psaropoulou says. “I’ve besides carried h2o from the oversea for the toilet.”

Dimitris Papadakis Jr, turns the valve connected a instrumentality that is connected to a tiny generator, to h2o an olive grove successful the colony of Nea Silata astatine Halkidiki peninsula, bluish Greece, August 19. [Giannis Papanikos/AP]

According to the European Union’s Emergency Management Service, acute drought conditions presently beryllium astir the Black Sea, stretching westward into bluish Greece.

Along the Evros River, which divides Greece and Turkey, terrible drought means the delta present has higher levels of seawater. The other brackish is sidesplitting the chaotic horses that beryllium connected the stream for drinking water.

“If the horses spell without h2o for a week, they die,” says Nikos Mousounakis, who is starring an inaugural to make freshwater drinking points for the horses. “Some of them are inactive successful atrocious shape, but we anticipation that with continued help, they’ll recover.”

Until recently, Lake Picrolimni successful bluish Greece was a fashionable destination for mud baths, but this summertime it’s a shallow basin of cracked earth, adust capable to clasp the value of a car.

“It hasn’t rained for 2 years now, truthful the water has wholly dried up,” says section municipal president Costas Partsis. “It utilized to person a batch of water. People came and bathed successful the muddy water. The clay has therapeutic properties for galore ailments. No 1 came this year.”

Nearby, Lake Doirani straddles Greece’s bluish borderline with North Macedonia. The shoreline has receded by 300 meters (yards) successful caller years. Local officials are pleading for nationalist works to reconstruct the river’s h2o supply, echoing calls from experts who reason that large changes successful h2o absorption are needed to mitigate the damaging effects of clime change.

“We’re experiencing a prolonged play of drought lasting astir 3 years now, owed to little rainfall and snowfall, a effect of the clime situation and mediocre h2o management,” says Konstantinos S. Voudouris, a prof of hydrogeology astatine the University of Thessaloniki. “The solution lies successful 3 cardinal words: conservation, storage, and reuse.”

Voudouris argues that outdated h2o networks are losing excessively overmuch h2o and that infrastructure improvements indispensable absorption connected collecting and storing rainwater during the bedewed season, arsenic good arsenic reusing treated wastewater for agriculture.

“These drought phenomena volition instrumentality with greater strength successful the future,” Voudouris said. “We request to instrumentality enactment and program up to minimize their impact… and we indispensable accommodate to this caller reality.” [AP]

The dried retired Lake Picrolimni is seen from above, adjacent the colony of Mikrokampos, bluish Greece, August 19. [Giannis Papanikos/AP]