The shallow lake was at its most expansive in recent decades in the late 1990s …. But a 5-year dry spell that began in 1998 was coupled with increasing water diversion for irrigation. “We call it anthropogenic drought,” says Amir AghaKouchak, [professor of civil & environmental engineering], a hydrologist at the University of California (UC), Irvine, who first visited Urmia as a student in 1998. … In the past few years, such worries receded as ample precipitation helped boost lake levels by about 1.5 meters. “Nature has been kind,” says Soroosh Sorooshian, [Distinguished Professor, civil & environmental engineering], a water expert at UC Irvine. Read More