Bolivia’s Second-Largest Lake Disappears, Due to Climate Change
Bolivia has officially declared that their second-largest lake, Lake Poopó, has disappeared. While long-term water diversion for mining and agricultural use has been cited as a partial culprit, an El Niño-driven drought, along with the disappearance of the Andean glaciers that fed the lake, are being blamed for the lake’s disappearance.
While Lake Poopó’s size historically sees large fluctuations due to it’s relative shallowness, this is the first time it has essentially disappeared, now being at only 2% of it’s former maximum water level of 5 meters (16.4 feet). A recent study showed that the water the lake received in 2013 wasn’t enough to maintain it’s equilibrium, short by 161 billion liters (42.5 billion gallons).
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