Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Earth's surface water change over the past 30 years

Nature Climate Change volume 6, pages 810–813 (2016)Cite this article

Subjects

Earth's surface gained 115,000 km2 of water and 173,000 km2 of land over the past 30 years, including 20,135 km2 of water and 33,700 km2 of land in coastal areas. Here, we analyse the gains and losses through the Deltares Aqua Monitor — an open tool that detects land and water changes around the globe.

Changes from land to water and vice versa are extremely relevant as witnessed by many recent news items: the President of Kiribati declared that his people would need to move to new grounds to prevent them from dying from the effects of sea-level rise on the atoll1; the impoundment of the Three Gorges Dam in China is causing massive inundations, forcing about 1.3 million people to resettle2; new islands along the coast of Dubai are created to provide new secluded areas for leisure and residence for the wealthy; and finally, the Mississippi Delta is losing thousands of hectares of land per year due to soil subsidence and lack of sediments3, further aggravated by sea-level rise.

This is a preview of subscription content

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1: Heat map of global surface water and land changes.
Figure 2: Largest surface water and land changes from 1985 until 2015 grouped by drainage basins.
Figure 3: Examples of surface water changes between 1985 and 2015, detected using the Aqua Monitor.

References

  1. 1

    Weiss, K. R. Nature 526, 624–627 (2015).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  2. 2

    Jackson, S. & Sleigh, A. Commun. Post-Commun. 33, 223–241 (2000).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. 3

    Giosan, L., Syvitski, J., Constantinescu, S. & Day, J. Nature 516, 31–33 (2014).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  4. 4

    Storlazzi, C. D., Elias, E. P. L. & Berkowitz, P. Sci. Rep. 5, 14546 (2015).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  5. 5

    Kirwan, M. L., Temmerman, S., Skeehan, E. E., Guntenspergen, G. R. & Faghe, S. Nature Clim. Change 6, 253–260 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. 6

    Dai, Z., Liu, J. T., Wei, W. & Chen, J. Sci. Rep. 4, 6600 (2014).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  7. 7

    Hansen, M. C. et al. Science 342, 850–853 (2013).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  8. 8

    Donchyts, G., Schellekens, J., Winsemius, H., Eisemann, E. & van de Giesen, N. Remote Sens. 8, 386 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. 9

    García, L., Rodríguez, J. D., Wijnen, M. & Pakulski, I. Earth Observation for Water Resources Management: Current Use and Future Opportunities for the Water Sector (The World Bank, 2016)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  10. 10

    Lehner, B. et al. Front. Ecol. Environ. 9, 494–502 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. 11

    Sang-Hun, C. South Korea rejects North's explanation of dam release. New York Times (7 September 2009).

  12. 12

    Davidson, C. Middle East Rep. 251, 8–13 (2009).

    Google Scholar 

  13. 13

    Glantz, M. H. Creeping Environmental Problems and Sustainable Development in the Aral Sea Basin (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1999).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  14. 14

    Micklin, P. Environ. Earth Sci. 75, 844 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. 15

    Barnett, T. P. & Pierce, D. W. Wat. Resour. Res. 44, W03201 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. 16

    Mohamed, Y. A., van den Hurk, B. J. J. M., Savenije, H. H. G. & Bastiaanssen, W. G. M. Wat. Resour. Res. 41, W08420 (2005).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. 17

    Barros, V. R. et al. in Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability Ch. 5 (IPCC, Cambridge Univ. Press, 2015).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Affiliations

  1. Deltares, Boussinesqweg 1, Delft, 2629 HV, The Netherlands

    Gennadii Donchyts, Fedor Baart, Hessel Winsemius & Jaap Kwadijk

  2. Delft University of Technology, Stevinweg 1, Delft, 2628 CN, The Netherlands

    Gennadii Donchyts, Fedor Baart & Nick van de Giesen

  3. Google, Brandschenkestrasse 110, Zürich, 8002, Switzerland

    Noel Gorelick

  4. University of Twente, Enschede, 7500 AE, The Netherlands

    Jaap Kwadijk

Authors
  1. Gennadii Donchyts
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Fedor Baart
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Hessel Winsemius
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Noel Gorelick
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Jaap Kwadijk
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Nick van de Giesen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Gennadii Donchyts.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Donchyts, G., Baart, F., Winsemius, H. et al. Earth's surface water change over the past 30 years. Nature Clim Change 6, 810–813 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3111

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3111

Further reading

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing