- Researchers estimate that human-caused climate change made the conditions that led to Canada’s far-reaching wildfires this summer twice as likely.
- Hundreds of thousands of people in Puerto Rico are subject to mandated water rationing that is leaving taps dry for two days at a time.
- A new report from England’s Environmental Agency reveals that every single surface water body in the country is contaminated with toxic chemicals.
- As many of Europe’s largest waterways experience record-low flows, officials worry the Rhine River will “effectively split into two.”
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Puerto Rico’s water crisis has gone from bad to worse in recent weeks, as new government-mandated rationing is leaving hundreds of thousands of people on the island without running water for stretches lasting 48 hours at a time, BBC reports. The cuts reached 180,000 homes in the capital, San Juan, last Friday.
The island’s water shortages are being attributed to lengthy dry spells and record-breaking heatwaves. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, more than half of Puerto Rico is experiencing moderate to severe drought, while July was the driest month recorded in San Juan in more than 120 years. These arid, sweltering conditions have been exacerbated by long-standing concerns over aging water infrastructure that is susceptible to leaks and bouts of low pressure.
In a 2019 report card published by the American Society of Civil Engineers, Puerto Rico’s drinking water infrastructure received a D grade, with both dams and wastewater infrastructure earning a D+. In an update published last December, experts estimated that the U.S. territory needs $3.9 billion to improve its public drinking water utilities, on which 96 percent of the island relies.
In June, Puerto Rico’s Governor Jenniffer González Colón activated the National Guard to circulate four 2,000-gallon tanker trucks through communities to deliver water. The country’s tourism and agriculture sectors have additionally put several water delivery vehicles into service around the island.
Slow changes are underway. On Monday, Gov. González Colón announced that Puerto Rico had secured more than $509 million of FEMA aid to repair the Guajataca Dam, which forms a reservoir that provides drinking water for some 300,000 people. Built in 1929, it suffered significant damage during the landfall of Hurricane Maria in 2017. In 2023, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed a $1 billion agreement with the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority to make permanent repairs and improvements on the structure.
Every single water body in England is contaminated with toxic chemicals.
Official data from England’s Environment Agency, published last week, reveals that every single surface water body in the country — 4,658 rivers, lakes, estuaries, and streams — contains chemicals at levels above set national standards. The findings, which are analyzed and released as public reports every six years, come from water samples collected between 2019 and 2025. The Guardian reports that it will take until at least 2063 for ubiquitous good chemical status to be achieved.
“The results show that too many water bodies are still not achieving the standards we want to see,” Alan Lovell, Chair of the Environment Agency, says in a statement. “We share the public’s ambition for faster progress which is why we are transforming our enforcement work with better data, stronger powers and our largest ever enforcement workforce.”
England’s waters received slightly better — though still failing — grades when measured for other indicators. Just 14.3 percent of the country’s surface waters achieved good ecological status, while 41 percent of groundwater bodies were considered in “good” health, with 59 percent classifying as “poor.”
Many of Europe’s largest rivers are running dangerously dry as extreme summer heat and drought continue to stalk the continent.
Record-low average flow rates have been measured along 95 percent of the Thames, 85 percent of the Rhine, two-thirds of the Danube, and 30 percent of the Rhone, France24 reports.
Industry officials in Germany are paying close attention to the Rhine — Europe’s busiest inland shipping waterway — which could be “effectively split in two” as its water levels deplete, according to Deutsche Welle.
A new analysis from World Weather Attribution — an international scientific collaboration that examines the extent to which climate change impacts weather events — found that this summer’s wildfire season in Canada was made twice as likely to occur by human-caused climate change.
The group of scientists found that fires like those experienced last month, which blanketed the Great Lakes region in smog and haze for days, are expected to occur every two to six years in Canada’s Northwest Territories, and every six to 15 years in Ontario. In a world without climate change, experts say, these extreme events would occur less than once every 40 years.
“We have seen repeatedly how climate change increases hot, dry, and flammable conditions that are extremely conducive to wildfires,” Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London, says in a press release. “This time, we studied Canada, for the second time in 3 years. Less than a week ago, we looked at France and Spain. A few months ago, we were looking at Chile and Argentina. What is going to be next?”
The hot, dry conditions that led to this summer’s widespread blazes — which have burned more than 9.4 million acres around Canada — have had a disproportionate impact on the country’s Indigenous communities. First Nations communities have accounted for 42 percent of all wildfire evacuations, despite comprising just 5 percent of the country’s population, Mongabay reports.
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