BBC reports on global warming threats to the Panama Canal.
Global warming and changing weather patterns are affecting the water supply for one of the world’s most important waterways, the Panama Canal, as well as access to drinking water for millions of Panamanians, Panama City journalist Grace Livingstone reports.
The Panama Canal is a major engineering feat of the 20th century.
Upon its completion in 1914, this man-made waterway connecting the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans nearly halved the travel time between the US West Coast and Europe.
To this day, ships must pass through a series of locks to overcome elevation differences along its 50-mile (80 km) length. They rise up to 26 meters above sea level before descending again. The canal’s locks act as a kind of elevator, using large amounts of water released from man-made mountaintop lakes to lift ships, explains Mahelis de García, a Panama Canal guide. But as global warming affects weather patterns, running the canal is becoming an ever greater challenge.
According to the Panama Canal Authority, 2019 was the fifth driest year in Panama in 70 years with rainfall 20% below the historical average. But it’s not just dry years that cause difficulties – heavy rain can also create problems as it can cause man-made lakes to overflow. As dry years and storms become more common, the canal must find fresh sources of water and new ways to conserve it.
Every time a ship passes through the lock, 55 m gallons (250 m liters) of fresh water are used and then released into the sea. On average, 37 ships pass through the locks each day, using more than 2 billion gallons (9 billion liters) of fresh water.
The vice president of water projects at the Panama Canal, John Langman, says they are working to find solutions to ensure the canal does not run out of water. “We understand that the canal is of great importance to the Panamanian economy.” He explains that in the extremely dry year of 2019, the canal authorities had to reduce the amount of water they used to operate the locks, which meant ships could not carry such heavy loads because there was less water between the cabins of the ship and the bottom of the channel.
To keep the locks working, canal authorities are looking for ways to store more water in rainy years to ensure a sufficient supply in drier times. They are conducting feasibility studies on a number of options, including deepening existing man-made lakes to capture more rainwater. Mr Langman says they will first aim to find a solution within the catchment around the canal, but may have to look at water sources in other parts of the country.
Neither option is easy.
One possibility that the canal authorities are studying is the construction of a dam on the Indio River, in the province of Coclé in central Panama. But this could displace thousands of small farmers and has worried Diego Herrera, who farms 40 hectares of land with his family in Coquillo. [. . .]
The Panama Canal has exceptionally good meteorological records because it has monitored rainfall since 1880.
Steven Paton, a scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, says this 142-year record shows changes in rainfall that are consistent with climate change. He says that in the last 25 years, “we’ve had eight of the 10 biggest storms, the two driest years and the three driest years in which the average rainfall was lower than in any other three-year period. We’ve set all kinds of records.” He adds that weather patterns are becoming less predictable: for example, 2022 has seen the earliest start to Panama’s rainy season since records began. [. . .] For the full article, see https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-62407514
