China faces record heat and drought

The vague of heat sustainability that China has just experienced has led to a drought catastrophic. The most affected area, the Yangzi basin which crosses central China from west to east over 6,300 km, is home to millions of people. The heat wave lasted more than 70 consecutive days, with temperatures often above 40°C in more than 17 provinces, affecting 900 million people.

More than 260 stations weather report Chinese cities recorded an absolute heat record during the summer of 2022. The weather services recorded up to 45°C in Beibei during the day and up to 34.9°C in the middle of the night in Chongqing.

The entire southern half of the country was affected by the drought, qualified as severe (level 3 out of 4) over a third of China. In Hunan, the rainfall deficit during the summer reaches -60%. Southern Asia, including China, is one of the areas most affected on the planet by heat waves caused or aggravated by global warming.

The country’s largest freshwater lake has dried up

the poyang lake is a vivid example of historic drought. The level of this lake, the largest in the country in terms ofpure waterfluctuates betweenwinter and summer, but the season summer is always marked by a high level due to frequent rains. However, the lake was unable to refill in the summer of 2022 due to the lack of rain and drought in the Yangzi basin. These images from Nasa’s OLI and Landsat8 satellites show the difference between July 10 and August 27, 2022.

The highest level of the year was reached at the end of June (25 meters), just before the 1^D photo, and then dropped up to 12 meters until August 6. Never such a low level had been recorded in summer since records began in 1951. On August 30, the level fell again to 8.9 meters. This extremely low level corresponds to that found in winter and therefore occurred 100 days in advance. Millions of people depend on this lake for drinking water,irrigation crops and electricity.

Lack of water has national and international consequences

The country’s second largest freshwater lake, Dongting, is also suffering from historic drought. The Yangzi river fell to its lowest level since 1865, forcing power cuts. In this area, many businesses have been forced to close due to the lack of electricity from hydroelectric power. The province of Sichuan normally generates 30% of China’s hydroelectric power, but the 2022 heat and drought waves were responsible for a sharp drop in production: 440 million kWh per day instead of 900 million kWh per day. normal day.

L’agriculture also suffers enormously from the lack of water: to support farmers suffering from drought, the Chinese government has announced that it will release an envelope of 10 billion yuan (1.45 billion euros). The production of rice, corn and wheat are strongly affected and this will have consequences on the level of the food supply, as well as on the level of the economy, with repercussions abroad. A hard blow for world food production at a time when cereal imports are already necessary in many countries to compensate for the consequences of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.