Climate Change in the Middle East: Complex Causes and Effects

1. Climate Change in the Middle East: Complex Causes and Effects

2. Climate Change Predictions for MENA • Higher temperatures (1-2 degree rise by 2050) • Reduced or steady (low) precipitation • Increased incidence of drought, heat waves • Reduced surface water; increased stress on already depleted groundwater reserves • Sea level rise of .5 meter by 2100 • Reduction in agricultural output • Relatively low carbon emissions--focus on adaptation • Challenge for hydroelectric generation and irrigation

3. In an already arid region, climate change will • reduce agricultural productivity through desertification and drought, increased soil salinity, inability to irrigate • increase stress on urban populations and their access to safe water, • inundate many coastal areas, forcing population relocation and further reducing agricultural output

4. Water is: • Geography: • climate change • Middle Eastern aridity • localized adaptation

5. Water is: • Science: • new desalinization techniques • Adaptation of new plants tolerant of higher salinity • traditional water gathering/storing/transporting • Newly discovered aquifers in the desert, etc. • New health challenges and disease vectors

6. Water is: • Economics: • Agriculture • Hydroelectric projects • Fisheries • Transportation • Urbanization • Tourism • Restrictions on development

7. Water is: • Politics • legitimacy for govts (GAP, Libya pipeline, agriculture in Israel, Jordan river/Golan) • Food shortages/riots • Inequities in water use/access • disputes over river flows and water sovereignty (Tigris/Euphrates, bargaining chip in other issues) • Exacerbation of conflict between neighbors (Israel/Palestine, Israel/Jordan, Turkey/Iraq) • international challenge: how do we solve regional issues with global implications?

8. Water is: • Society: • food riots in Egypt, • urban centers with too little water, • health problems from contaminated water due to reduced river flows, • new environmentalist civil society vs. new aspirations

9. Water is: • Culture: • marsh Arabs, • Bedouin, • urbanization, • changing sustenance farming and fishing villages • disruption of traditional water-sharing mechanisms

10. Four case studies:EgyptTurkeyIraqIsrael-Palestine

11. Egypt

12. Egypt’s impact on global emissions

13. Sea Level Rise Effects on Egypt

14. Turkey

15. Istanbul skyline

16. Southeast Anatolian Project

17. Iraq

20. Tigris-Euphrates Flow

21. Measuring Salinity of Soil

22. Israel-Palestine

23. Jordan River

24. Unequal water access