The drying up of the Aral Sea between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan inspired a researcher to conduct a revolutionary evaluation that has concluded half of the world’s biggest lakes are experiencing water depletion, according to a report by SciTechDaily, citing a study recently published by the journal Science.

The Aral Sea, fed by rivers that flow through countries including Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan, has long been a fascination for researchers seeking ways to protect the world’s lakes, threatened by climate change and unsustainable water usage by humans.

Fangfang Yao, the principal author of the study and a CIRES visiting fellow who is currently a climate fellow at the University of Virginia, was reported as saying the situation isn’t all doom and gloom. The introduction of his novel evaluation technique for monitoring lake water storage trends and their underlying causes enables scientists to offer valuable insights to water management professionals and local communities, wrote SciTechDaily. “This new knowledge can guide them in effectively safeguarding crucial water resources and preserving vital regional ecosystems,” it said.

“This is the first comprehensive assessment of trends and drivers of global lake water storage variability based on an array of satellites and models,” Yao was cited as saying.

He and colleagues from the University of Colorado Boulder, Kansas State University, France and Saudi Arabia formulated a technique to measure changes in water levels in nearly 2,000 of the world’s biggest lakes and reservoirs. They account for 95% of the total lake water storage on Earth.

Three decades of observations from an array of satellites were combined with models to quantify and attribute trends in lake storage globally.

“We have pretty good information on iconic lakes like the Caspian Sea, Aral Sea and Salton Sea, but if you want to say something on a global scale, you need reliable estimates of lake levels and volume,” Balaji Rajagopalan, a CIRES fellow, professor of engineering at CU Boulder and co-author was reported as saying, adding: “With this novel method …we are able to provide insights into global lake level changes with a broader perspective.”