July 2007
An underground lake the size
of Lake Erie has been discovered beneath the windblown sands of Sudan's
Darfur region. The newly mapped water source may help to alleviate the
conflict between Arab nomads and the African farming population that has
killed more than 200,000 people and affected at least four million others
since 2003.
Identification of the lake’s shorelines was done by geologist Dr. Farouk
El-Baz, director of Boston University's Center for Remote Sensing, and Dr.
Eman Ghoneim, a research professor at the center.
Based on location of the Northern Darfur Mega-lake, a new humanitarian
initiative to bring water resources to the region has been launched by the
government of Sudan following a meeting last month between El-Baz and
Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir.
Called "1,000 Wells for Darfur," the plan aims to create new groundwater
resources to help establish peace and economic security in the region.
The project gained immediate support from the government of Egypt -
Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation Dr. Mahmoud Abu Zeid has
pledged to drill the initial 20 wells.
The United Nations Mission in Sudan also plans to drill several wells for
use by its peacekeeping forces.
Sudan's Minister of Irrigation and Water Resources Dr. Kamal Ali, who also
attended the meeting, said he believes "1,000 Wells for Darfur" will be a
success.
"Access to fresh water is essential for refugee survival, will help the
peace process, and provides the necessary resources for the much needed
economic development in Darfur," said El-Baz.
"Any person, organization or county can contribute to this humanitarian
effort. Those who provide $10 million or drill 10 wells will have their
names on the wells forever," he said.
Though the ancient lake has dried up, its water is believed to have sunk
into the sand and become part of the groundwater.
"One thing is certain – much of the lake’s water would have seeped through
the sandstone substrate to accumulate as groundwater," said El-Baz.
Egyptian born El-Baz, a veteran of NASA’s Apollo program of lunar
exploration, has pioneered the study of desert landscapes using satellite
images, particularly for the location of groundwater resources in the
Middle East and Africa.
El-Baz said the lake under Darfur lies at 573 meters above sea level. It
occupies an area of 30,750 square kilometers, or 11,873 square miles,
about the size of Lake Erie, and would have contained some 2,530 cubic
kilometers of water when full during humid climate phases in the past.
It would not be the first time satellite data has helped find water
beneath the Sahara Desert. In the early 1980s, El-Baz detected a similar
ancient lake in the East Uweint basin in southwestern Egypt, where water
is as close as 25 meters below the sandy surface. Since then, 500 wells
have been dug, irrigating up to 150,000 acres of farmland in this area,
just northeast of Darfur.
"We hope this new lake will do the same for the Sudanese, and especially
for the people of Darfur," says Ghoneim.
El-Baz says the 1,000 Wells initiative has been well received by the
public in Sudan. "The Governor of Northern Darfur Osman Kebir told me that
news of the lake discovery brought smiles to the faces of the people in
Darfur, and much needed hope to us all," said El-Baz.
According to the Network for Water and Sanitation, NETWAS, a Nairobi-based
capacity building and information network for Africa, water conflicts in
Darfur have worsened over the past two decades as less rain has fallen on
the region.
"The rainfall pattern has changed in the last 20 years, leading to a
decline in intensity and shortened rainfall duration," NETWAS says.
"The rainy season used to be May-Sept but has today been shortened to
June-August," says NETWAS. "Southward encroachment of the desert presents
a serious threat to the livelihoods of the communities."
The new water resource is sorely needed in Darfur where the security
situation continues to deteriorate displacing more than 400,000 people in
the last year, according to the Washington-based Save Darfur Coalition.
Four million people are now affected by the crisis, which has spread from
Sudan into Chad and the Central African Republic, and almost a quarter of
these people cannot get humanitarian assistance because of insecurity.
The next step for the 1,000 Wells for Darfur project is the identification
of the best locations for drilling of the initial wells.
"We plan to select the most appropriate sites through detailed analysis of
space image data, geophysical surveys by local experts to confirm
satellite image interpretations, and on-the-ground field data collection
to determine the needs of the local communities," said El-Baz.
"New water resources will provide hope to the people of northwestern Sudan
and will also allow for the migration of the labor force closer to the
wells," he said, "where economic development is suitable and
environmentally sustainable."
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