Scientists warn of Caspian Sea shallowing

A drop in the level of the Caspian Sea below the critical level will probably lead to a reduction in the delta of rivers flowing into it, including the Volga and Ural rivers. This may provoke changes in the ecosystem and bring a threat to some types of economic activities. At the meeting of the Presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), which is devoted to the rational use of water resources of the country, the Deputy Director of the Shirshov Institute of Oceanology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) reported about it. P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology Petr Zavyalov.

According to the scientist, the decline in the average level of the Caspian Sea has been observed since the mid-1990s. Now it is at -28.7 meters - one of the lowest values in the history of observations. The same situation was in 1977, after which the volume of water in the sea increased. Whether it will happen now, experts cannot predict with certainty.

"Predicting processes in the Caspian Sea is extremely difficult. There are a lot of factors that the current models take into account. In addition, the sea is divided between five coastal countries into sectors, and there is a problem of obtaining homogeneous data obtained by uniform methods," Zavyalov said.

He added that one of the main factors in the decline of the Caspian Sea level is water losses in the deltas of large rivers - the Volga and the Ural, which, according to some estimates, account for about 10% of the total river flow into the sea.

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