A planetary boundary for green water
Water is the bloodstream of the biosphere, but we are profoundly changing the water cycle. This is now affecting the health of the entire planet, making it significantly less resilient to shocks. A reassessment of the planetary boundary for freshwater indicates that it has now been transgressed, according to a recent assessment. The paper was performed by an international consortium, led by by Stockholm Resilience Centre, and published on Nature, April 2022.
Ruud van der Ent, assistant professor at TU Delft (Water Management) who was one of the co-authors explains: "Previous assessments focused primarily on river water flow and missed important information about the complete water cycle. We now focused on root zone soil moisture as the primary indicator for the health of our water cycle, which supports healthy and resilient ecosystems that capture carbon and in turn regulate the atmospheric water cycle."
Image by Stockholm Resilience Centre