Angelina Davydova, reporting for Reuters:
Délirante bestiole, Flickr
“In Russia’s Siberian south, near the border of Mongolia, the world’s largest freshwater lake is shrinking. The surrounding communities depend on Lake Baikal, which contains about one-fifth of the earth’s unfrozen freshwater reserves, for their power, water and livelihoods.
But in the past four months the lake’s water level has dropped so low that experts are calling it a crisis – one they warn could lead to conflicts in Russia over water. The lake is now at its lowest level in over 30 years and experts predict it will keep dropping until melting mountain snow and spring rains begin to recharge the lake around late April or mid-May...
For now, the government is allowing the Irkutsk hydroelectric power station to continue drawing river water that might otherwise have supplied the lake in order to keep the region supplied with heat, power and clean water.”
NASA; Irkutsk Dam on the lake's southeast outlet, the Angara River
