Russia and Azerbaijan create committee on Caspian shallowing

Baku, Azerbaijan (Ports Europe) October 6, 2024 – “Want to kill an idea? Form a committee”. Caspian Sea shallowing has led to reduced load of ships and extensive dredging of ports. Following years of inactivity, Russia and Azerbaijan created a committee to tackle the issue of receding Caspian waters. True to the saying “If you want nothing done – form a committee”, the new bilateral body will do nothing more than study the causes of changes in the Caspian Sea level, short-term and long-term forecasts, monitor water level fluctuations… The “Death by Committee” approach does not include the other littoral states – Iran, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. It also ignores the obvious problem – reduced water inflow via Russia’s giant Volga River. The Volga is blocked by many hydro-energy structures and is extensively used for irrigation, which leads to reduced water inflow into the Caspian. The sea The Caspian Sea is the largest (371,000 to 384,400 km²) and most voluminous (78,000 to 78,700 km³) inland body of water in the world. Its physical environment and its floor have oceanic characteristics. The sea lies in an elongated depression between the European and Asian continental plates. Its surface is well below sea level, with a maximum depth of 980 m in the south and a shallow northern half averaging just 5.2 metres. The sea extends more than 1,000 km from north to south, and is bounded by deserts in the north and east, and by grasslands and forests in the west and south. The surface of the world’s largest (salty) lake lying between Europe and Asia has fallen by several centimetres a year since the 1990s, with the rate of water shrinkage set to increase dramatically as global temperatures continue to increase. The Caspian’s low salinity is due to freshwater input. The Volga River contributes up to 82% of the inflow, with the rest supplied by some 130 other rivers, principally the Ural, Kura and Atrek. Caspian as a crossroad of transport corridors Littoral states believe that the Caspian Sea has huge potential for them to develop a transshipment role in China’s new Silk Road, an economic strategy to seek better access to Chinese products in European markets. The Caspian Sea is also a key transport link in the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR, Middle Corridor) that bypasses Western sanctions-hit Russia and the promoted by Moscow International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) that bypasses sanctions. The sea occupies a key location facilitating water transport in both North-South and East-West directions. Developing international rail transport also attracts more distant countries, such as India, to use the Caspian Sea as a route to states in Europe and Russia. Scientific explanation of the problem The decline in the Caspian Sea level over the past decades has become a serious problem affecting the ecology, economy, and social aspects of the countries bordering this inland body of water. There are concerns about the long-term consequences of this phenomenon, including loss of biodiversity, deterioration of water and air quality, threats to economic stability, and ports turning into stranded assets. The Caspian Sea started shrinking in the mid-1990s and its level is projected to fall by metres by 2100, according to a study published in December 2020 in Communications Earth & Environment journal. If scientific projections are correct, if global warming continues or worsens and rivers’ inflow in the Caspian continues to decrease, the sea’s surface area will shrink between 23%, with a 9-metre reduction, and by 34% for an 18-metre drop in water level. Affected ports A loss of a third of the Caspian Sea surface would deliver a fatal blow to the 12 main ports located there and trigger a financial tsunami to the economies of the region. The worst affected would be the ports of Aktau, Atyrau and Kuryk in Kazakhstan as well as the Russian ports of Astrakhan, Makhachkala, and Olya. The Caspian’s largest and most successful harbour, Baku in Azerbaijan, will also be heavily impacted, as well as the country’s second port of Alat. The new Turkmenbashi (Turkmanbashi) port in Turkmenistan, a $1.5 billion (€1.32 billion) over-ambitious project for a poor and isolated state, will have difficulties in continuing operation (more about its problems here). Iranian Amirabad, Anzali and Nowshahr ports would require investments to be able to continue normal operations. According to scientific projections, the vast northern Caspian shelf, the Turkmen shelf in the southeast, and all coastal areas in the middle and southern Caspian Sea are expected to emerge from under the sea surface. In addition, the Kara-Bogaz-Gol Bay on the eastern shore will completely dry up. Some experts caution that the Caspian Sea level could stabilise or even start rising again unexpectedly as it happened some 40 years ago. This creates a serious dilemma for the financing of ports and related multimodal land and sea transport infrastructure – whether to invest now or wait for better projections. Ports Europe coverage of the Caspian drying up Putin alarmed by shrinking Caspian Sea, but no way to prevent it Kazakhstan to dredge Kuryk and Aktau ports World Bank, HR Wallingford step into shrinking Caspian problem More Ports Europe news about the Caspian Sea Aktau, the next Caspian Sea port to start dredging Shrinking Caspian Sea forces Kazakhstan to dredge its ports Urgent dredging to start in Baku port, Caspian Sea shrinks Update: Makhachkala port partly reopens after dredging Analysis: Sanctions busting Caspian Sea is drying up, new ships needed Analysis: Will Caspian ports become stranded assets if the sea shrinks? Copyright (C) Ports Europe. All Rights Reserved. 2024.

Russia and Azerbaijan create committee on Caspian shallowing

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Russia and Azerbaijan create committee on Caspian shallowing

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Cocaine seized in Port of Vigo, Galicia

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