"As rising seas increase saltwater intrusion and soaring temperatures cause greater evaporation, scientists say that the mounting levels of salt in waters and in soils pose a major climate-related danger and could become a leading cause of climate migration globally."
"The Mekong Delta is under a chemical threat arguably more deadly for the long term than the Agent Orange deployed across it during the Vietnam War half a century ago. By the middle of this century, it could be engulfed by a toxic onslaught from which there is no recovery — salt.
As sea levels rise, salty ocean water is pushing ever further into the delta, one of Southeast Asia’s most densely populated and productive rice-growing regions. During this year’s spring dry season, the salinity boundary — where salt levels exceed 4 grams per liter — reached up to 40 miles upstream, more than 10 miles further than it has historically.
The saline influx is in part caused by faltering flows of fresh water coming down the Mekong River into the delta, as China fills giant hydroelectric dams far upstream. But a new and pioneering modeling study of the delta, which is home to more than 20 million people, has concluded that by around 2050, rising sea levels in the South China Sea will be the dominant driver of salinization, making wide areas uninhabitable for rice farmers long before they are inundated by the ocean itself."
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