Ben See Profile picture
Aug 18, 2019 9 tweets 4 min read Read on X
The world’s largest sources of freshwater will be severely depleted by 2029, with catastrophic consequences for all of humanity.

[THREAD]
Timebomb:

Regions most sensitive to changes in climate include humid and wet areas, such as the Amazon, Indonesia and parts of central Africa. In some of these areas, it could take *less* than 10 years for climate change to fully impact groundwater flows.
carbonbrief.org/climate-change…
Groundwater response times:

The map below:

Yellow shows areas where groundwater is likely to fully respond to stresses in under 10 years. ⚠️

Light green shows where the response time is 10-100 years.

Dark green & blue: 100 to over 10,000 years.

Also👇
Areas with the shortest groundwater response times include wet, humid regions: the Amazon, the Congo Basin, Indonesia, and low-lying regions, such as the Asian mega-deltas and the Florida Everglades.

2 billion living with absolute water scarcity by 2025👇
Finite:

The water that supplies aquifers and wells for billions of people is mostly a non-renewable resource that could run out in many places.

Just 6% of the groundwater around the world is replenished and renewed within a "human lifetime" of 50 years.cbc.ca/news/technolog…
Today, nearly three and a half billion people struggle with severe water scarcity for 3 months of the year.

The #EcologicalEmergency is right now, and has been going on for decades. Time for meaningful international solidarity - that means system change.

Most over-stressed is the Arabian Aquifer System, which supplies water to 60 million people in Saudi Arabia & Yemen; the Indus Basin aquifer in northwest India & Pakistan is the second-most threatened; the Murzuk-Djado Basin in northern Africa the third. nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/07/w…
Today:

🔺1.9 billion people live in countries facing extremely high water stress

e.g India, Pakistan, Iran, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE

🔺Another 2.5 billion people face high levels of water stress
The likelihood of conflict:

'most regions of the world face significant hydropolitical vulnerabilities that, in a number of hot-spot basins, may turn into serious water conflict in the decades to come'

The rapid pace of climate breakdown is a key threat.link.springer.com/chapter/10.100…

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More from @ClimateBen

Aug 9
Destruction of habitats and wildlife has intensified and accelerated to an almost unimaginable degree during the capitalist era. Scientists say the 40-50% of plant species now facing extinction will be obliterated in a handful of decades. It didn't have to be like this. Rethink. Plants are going extinct up to 350 times faster than the historical norm
1. Capitalism: a 'meteorite'

'previous mass extinctions.. took 10,000s, 100,000s, even millions of years to happen. this is happening so fast, now in just two, three decades..'
google.com/amp/s/www.cbsn…

Recovery: "we most likely won’t be there to see it"..
discovermagazine.com/earth-is-on-th…
2. Current estimates of plant extinctions are, without a doubt, gross underestimates. Extinctions will surpass background rates by 1000s of times over the next 80 years. universityofcalifornia.edu/news/plants-ar…
Read 8 tweets
Jul 23
icymi: our coastal cities will be smashed by multi-metre sea level rise within decades Peak global mean temperature, atmospheric CO2, maximum global mean sea level (GMSL), and source(s) of meltwater.  Light blue shading indicates uncertainty of GMSL maximum. Red pie charts over Greenland and Antarctica denote fraction (not location) of ice retreat.
The Greenland ice sheet is now losing around 9 billion litres of ice an hour [Geological Survey of Denmark &Greenland]

With the ice sheet at “a tipping point of irreversible melting”, scientists currently expect an unavoidable sea level rise of 1-2 metres.weforum.org/stories/2025/0…
4 to 10 m sea level rise committed in the coming 2000 years, with the majoroty of that in the coming decades/centuries it would appear.
science.org/doi/10.1126/sc…

x.com/climate_ice/st…
Read 4 tweets
Jul 21
BREAKING: horrific worst-case scenarios firmly back on the table as scientists confirm large-scale Earth systems such as forests, ice sheets, and ocean currents may already be collapsing 🧵
'large-scale Earth systems may be experiencing gradual collapses that are easy to miss, with profound implications

"we may already be crossing tipping points without realizing"

Slow changes can be deceptive

some systems may slide into collapse silently'
phys.org/news/2025-07-e…
Read 5 tweets
Jul 19
BREAKING: as global warming accelerates wildly normally reticent Establishment scientists begin to discuss plausibility of near-term human extinction 🧵
1/'It seems very unlikely that extinction is on the table for any but the most severe scenarios of climate negligence. However, it is easy to envision a collapse of human civilization.'

What Dr Mann won't say: new papers show 3.5-5°C is entirely likely. gizmodo.com/is-climate-cha…
2/We know relatively low levels of warming like 2 or 2.5°C (which are in fact absolutely extreme given the rapid rate of change) could mean human extinction. Dr Mann would agree 2.25-3.25°C is likely/very likely to hit in a few/handful of decades.

Thread:
Read 6 tweets
Jul 19
BREAKING: climate scientists say it's now easy to envision a collapse of human civilization 🧵
1. it is easy to envision a collapse of human civilization:

'Without even appealing to the uncertain science of climate tipping points, the known impacts of climate change.. would be more than adequate to destabilize our societal infrastructure.'
gizmodo.com/is-climate-cha…
2. Climate scientists project 2°C and rising by the 2030s/40s, with 2.5°C or more by the 2040s/50s or soon after. There is no evidence whatsoever humans can survive that rate of change and the abrupt shift to extreme new conditions.

2-4°C is very likely.
Read 6 tweets
Jun 21
Has capitalism left it too late to avoid hellish 2/2.5°C of global warming and rising?

Yes.

Can we adapt?

No.

Has the scientific community issued major consensus reports indicating political-economic systems changes are mandatory?

Yes.

Will journalists reveal this?

No.

🧵
The planet you think you're living on no longer exists. This Extinction Economy has set up conditions which scientists fear will prove unsurvivable for the majority of species within decades. Change this Doom-growth system now while it's still too late.
Global warming will happen faster than expected
Mass extinction media won't explain why we will hit 2/2.5°C by or before 2040-41. They are part of the state-corporate doom machine and don't want you researching clouds, aerosols, and climate sensitivity. Time to rethink to protect species and everyone.

Read 9 tweets

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