Humanity is rapidly depleting water and much of the world is getting drier

New research based on 22 years of satellite data shows vast areas of the world are losing fresh water and getting drier. These regions include much of the American West, Mexico, Central America and the Middle East.

The depletion of groundwater accounts for an estimated 68% of the water loss in the world’s drying regions. And the total water loss in these regions now surpasses mountain glacial melt as a contributor to sea level rise.

For more than two decades, satellites have tracked the total amounts of water held in glaciers, ice sheets, lakes, rivers, soil and the world’s vast natural reservoirs underground — aquifers. An extensive global analysis of that data now reveals fresh water is rapidly disappearing beneath much of humanity’s feet, and large swaths of the Earth are drying out.