Theyear 2022will be remember for the extreme heatwaves and droughts experienced across the world . FromIndia and Pakistantothe USandEurope , continents have been battlingextremely dry weather , followed by unsafe anddramatic floodingafter calendar month without seeing pelting . Satellite images have shown China ’s Yangtze River and many others have get through historical first , a terrific novel consequence of the unfolding clime crisis .
The Yangtze provide water to 400 million people in China as well as being used for hydropower and merchant vessels routes . It is the third longest river in the world and its drainage basin this year has receive 45 percent less rainfall than average . Therecord - breaking heatwaveChina is currently experiencing is anticipate to continue well into September .
observance from quad , by theCopernicus Sentinel-2 mission , show the Yangtze and Jialing rivers , near Chongqing , in August 2020 , 2021 , and last week . The difference is gross . The low stratum of water has reveal ancient Buddha statue in China . Over in Europe , ancient hunger stones have emerge from the drying Elbe rivertelling the great unwashed to begin cryingif they can see this message . In America , bodies have been emergingfrom the mud of Lake Mead .
Views of the Yangtze and Jialing rivers over the last two years. Image Credit: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2020-22), processed by ESA,CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
The heatwave in China has seen temperature reaching 40 ° C ( 104 ° atomic number 9 ) and they have remained consistently high for almost 70 days .
The state is currently experiment withcloud seeding , a material body of geoengineering , to try and release precious rainfall into regions originate crop . This technique uses silver iodide or other crystalline subatomic particle to act as the cell nucleus around which raindrops can organize . Scientists are divided on how good this proficiency is but this has not discontinue China from trying it .
