In a Parched Corner of Xinjiang, Ancient Water Tunnels Are Running Dry.
URPAN, China — It is an improbable journey that begins on the highest peaks of the Tianshan Mountains, where glacial snowmelt descends across one of the world’s most arid landscapes to reach the lush oasis communities of this ancient Silk Road outpost.
Powered by gravity, the water — pure and cold — makes the entire voyage underground, traveling through scores of subterranean channels, some of them 15 miles long and 100 feet deep, that were built 2,000 years ago by the pastoralists who settled this inhospitable corner of China’s far western Xinjiang region.
Known as karez, the system of channels is an engineering marvel that has long fascinated scientists and filled this city’s ethnic Uighurs with pride.
“Our ancestors were amazing because they built these without machines,” said Salayidin Nejemdin, 29, whose family has been growing grapes in Turpan for generations. “Without them, we would not be able to live in such a harsh place.”
But after millenniums of nourishing the region’s farmers, goat herders and cross-continental traders, the karez channels of Turpan are drying up. Although scientists say global warming has shrunk the glaciers that feed the elaborate irrigation system, the more immediate threat is the soaring demand for water from the petroleum drillers and industrial-scale farmers, who are sucking the Turpan Basin dry.'>>>
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/22/world/asia/china-xinjiang-turpan-water.html?
