Arid environments are basically associated with water scarcity. Therefore, soils will have an extremely low moisture level to support plant and animal life as well as human social life. Sustainability is the long durability of systems and processes within various adapted environmental conditions. Recently, systematic scientific studies on arid environments and sustainability have become more attractive, critical, and sound than the previous years. Sharing such experiences related to different environmental circumstances will absolutely help scientists and decision-makers to have better interpretation of their own environment. By learning lessons, appropriate, fast, and effective approaches require to implement for overwhelming such problems. Such actions will certainly lead to more secure and sustainable environments for plant, animal, and human life.
Arid environments are basically associated with water scarcity. Therefore, soils will have an extremely low moisture level to support plant and animal life as well as human social life. Sustainability is the long durability of systems and processes within various adapted environmental conditions. Recently, systematic scientific studies on arid environments and sustainability have become more attractive, critical, and sound than the previous years. Sharing such experiences related to different environmental circumstances will absolutely help scientists and decision-makers to have better interpretation of their own environment. By learning lessons, appropriate, fast, and effective approaches require to implement for overwhelming such problems. Such actions will certainly lead to more secure and sustainable environments for plant, animal, and human life.
International voices fill the pages of Water and Sustainability in Arid Regions, forming an original scientific exploration of current water research and management issues. In arid regions, agriculture that is ill-adapted to the environment, accelerated urbanization, poverty, and increasing pollution challenge access to and uses of water. Understanding these issues requires incorporating findings from both the physical and social sciences at different temporal and spatial scales. The chapters in this book were written by hydrologists, remote sensing specialists, ecologists, historians, economists, political scientists, architects, archaeologists, and other experts who live in and study arid lands. The authors present updates, overviews, and analyses of water challenges these areas have faced and are striving to address, from salinization in the fabled Taklimakan Desert in China to land degradation in the northern Mediterranean to groundwater over-exploitation in the southwestern United States. The book also examines desertification, remote sensing, qanat systems, architecture, arsenic contamination, and other case studies from Iran, the Maghreb region, Argentina and Chile, and Mexico. From this conceptual mosaic of comparative perspectives and research methods emerges a strong assumption: an interdisciplinary approach that combines physical and social sciences is the first step toward globally and comprehensively addressing water and sustainability."This book is a valuable and welcome contribution to the discussion of water and sustainable development. Through the collection of chapters, the book clearly illustrates the contemporary diversity of approaches to water scarcity and presents pertinent and new research findings that readers generally do not find compiled together. The result is a highly relevant, accessible, and timely resource that is unique in its international and interdisciplinary content. This is a must-read for anyone working on environmental and sustainability issues in arid lands."André Mariotti, University Pierre et Marie Curie, and INSU - CNRS (National Institute for Earth Sciences and Astronomy-National Center for Scientific Research/Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique), France "Anyone who reads this book will find himself or herself contemplating the need to rethink how we approach the issue of water and sustainability in arid lands. Drawing on the expertise of both physical and social scientists, the chapters taken as a whole present global, historic, and current perspectives on water scarcity in a multi-layered way that rarely has been done before." Miguel Solanes, Madrid Water Institute, Spain
This interdisciplinary volume examines how nine arid or semi-arid river basins with thriving irrigated agriculture are doing now and how they may change between now and mid-century. The rivers studied are the Colorado, Euphrates-Tigris, Jucar, Limarí, Murray-Darling, Nile, Rio Grande, São Francisco, and Yellow. Engineered dams and distribution networks brought large benefits to farmers and cities, but now the water systems face multiple challenges, above all climate change, reservoir siltation, and decreased water flows. Unchecked, they will see reduced food production and endanger the economic livelihood of basin populations. The authors suggest how to respond to these challenges without loss of food production, drinking water, or environmental health. The analysis of the political, hydrological, and environmental conditions within each basin gives policymakers, engineers, and researchers interested in the water/sustainability nexus a better understanding of engineered rivers in arid lands.
This publication aims to contribute to planning and management approaches that minimize land degradation and desertification in arid and semi-arid zones as a result of extractive industries operations. Both operational and policy guidance are included to help those government departments responsible for the licensing, planning and monitoring of extractive industries activities to take account of environment and development issues in their decision-making.
This essential reference guide to strategies and solutions for urban planning in hot arid environments reflects the journey toward many cities, towns and villages in Iran, which are documented and presented in the form of case studies and comparative analysis. It is the outcome of extensive research on the influence of historical, cultural and climatic factors on urban spatial forms and rural complexes in Iran’s Hot Arid Zone. The environment of the Hot Arid Zone offers valuable insights into how to overcome historical difficulties, how to endure harsh climatic conditions, how to be innovative and creative in responding to problems in new ways, and how to utilize natural energy sources. Considerable attention is given to the recognition of values, current problems and the renewal of traditional fabrics, urban blocks and traditional buildings. Important aspects in both academic education and in the urban design profession include traditional urban structures and traditional approaches to using natural energy as a creative process that is continuously changing and renews itself over time – a dynamic characteristic from which we can glean many lessons for the future. This book is based on a book previously published by the author in Persian. This version is an extensively revised version.
The book will be of interest to researchers and practitioners in the field of hydrology, environmental engineering, agricultural engineering, earth sciences, and watershed and range sciences, as well as to those engaged in water resources planning, development and management in arid and semi-arid areas. Given the lack of literature on arid regions, this book not only provides an assessment of water resource management in arid regions but also addresses solutions, and it can also be an outstanding textbook on water resources management and sustainability for arid regions. This volume in the Water Science and Technology Library includes selected papers that have been presented and discussed during the International Water Resources Management and Sustainability: Solutions for Arid Regions, 22–-24 March 2022, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The conference was organized by the National Water and Energy Center, UAE University, in collaboration with the South Australian Goyder Institute for Water Research, and the Department for Environment and Water, Government of South Australia. The conference attracted a large number of nationally and internationally well-known experts who have been at the forefront of water resources management and sustainability in arid and semi-arid regions. More than 55 countries, covering the five continents, were represented. The conference was designed to facilitate and encourage new perspectives on how science and innovative technologies can transform water management and sustainability in arid and semi-arid regions around the world. It addressed current challenges and priorities in water management and provided a forum to share knowledge, experiences, research, and discoveries.
This book offers comprehensive coverage of trace elements in arid zone regions. It begins by introducing the nature and properties of arid zone soil, followed by coverage of the major aspects of the trace elements and heavy metals of most concern in the world’s arid and semi-arid soils. A comprehensive, focused case study on transfer fluxes of trace elements in Israeli arid soils is used to illustrate the themes presented in the book.
The book is based on the results of the investigations of the authors in the semi-arid and arid regions (ASAR) of the globe. These investigations brought to the conclusion that the warming climate will cause the drying up of the water resources in these regions. In this case the principles of Sustainable Development will not be able to avert forthcoming catastrophes. These conclusions brought to the compilation of the policy of "Progressive Development", emphasising investment in the development of new water resources and changing the natural environments while advancing the local populations on the dimension of knowledge by education.
