New satellite data show that the drought in Brazil is worse than previously thought, with Southeast losing 56 trillion liters of water in each of the past three years, said a scientist at the US space agency (Nasa) this sexta- Thursday (30).
The worst drought in the country the past 35 years has also led the Brazilian Northeast, the largest region, but less populated, losing 49 trillion liters of water every year for the past three years, compared to normal levels, said hydrologist at NASA Augusto Getirana.
Brazilians are well aware of the drought, as water rationing, blackouts and empty reservoirs in parts of the country, but this is the first study that documents the exact amount of water that has disappeared from aquifers and reservoirs, Getirana said.
"It's much bigger than I imagined," said Getirana the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "With climate change, this will happen more and more often."
The Cantareira system that supplies water to 8.8 million residents of São Paulo, had, for example, less than 11 percent of its capacity last year, according to local authorities.
The research Getirana, published this week in the Journal of hydrometeorology, is based on 13 years of information from the satellites Gravity Recovery and Experiment Climate (Grace, its acronym in English) NASA circulating the Earth detecting changes caused gravity field by water movement on the planet.
The country has no absolute lack of water, said the researcher. The problem is that the densely populated regions, particularly the Southeast, depend on local aquifers and reservoirs that are not being replenished due to drought.
Theoretically, water can be transported to other parts of the country to affected cities, he said, but the financial and logistical costs would be enormous.
The new satellite information they must provide a wake-up call for politicians to better manage the water and act on climate change to deal with the crisis, said Getirana.
The data do not allow researchers to make predictions on how long the drought will last, he said, adding that water levels continued to fall in recent months.
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