The largest river in Germany, it's bottomed out

Author:Look at the think tank Time:2022.08.24

Last summer, Germany encountered a hundred years of floods that did not encounter. I did not expect that the Rhine Rhine has not encountered a hundred years of drought this year.

On August 16, the water level of Emmerich, the town of Dehe border, fell to zero -centimeter, setting the lowest record since its own hydrological records.

On August 13, 2022, a low -water level of Rhine. Figure ｜ IC Photo

In Cologne, people can now stand on the cracked Rhine River bed overlooking the Cologne Cathedral.

In more places, the police's warning to the public has changed from "don't play water by the river" to "don't try to swim crossing the Rhine."

The Rhine has passed through multiple countries, of which it is especially important to the Netherlands in Germany.

It is the most important shipping river and gold water channel in Germany.

Wen | The more direction

This article is reproduced from the WeChat public account "Earth Knowledge Bureau" (ID: Diqiuzhishiju). The original first was released on August 21, 2022. The original title was "The largest river in Germany, and it was dried up! ", Does not mean looking at the view of the think tank.

Golden waterway, it's almost bottomed out

The incident with indicator significance about the dryness of the Rhine is: After August 12, the water level of Kaub Town (KAUB, located in Rhine-Pharz) has dropped to 40 Below cm.

This has led to the loss of commercial navigation capacity above the town, and the navigation below Duisburg can barely maintain operation. The water level of Kooba Town on August 15 is only 32 cm, and it is estimated that it will drop by 5-10 cm in the next week.

The water level drops below 40cm, it is not suitable for most ships.

(Rhine Kaobu Observation Point Water Quota Reference: Pegelonline)

What must be explained here is that the water level line is not equal to the depth of water, because the benchmark is usually not far from the bank of the river (such as the foot of the river embankment), and it will not be located in the center of the main channel. So when we see the news that "the water level of the Rhine drops to 0 cm", in fact, the depth of the water in the Rhine Channel near Emiric is still close to 2 meters. In the Town of Kobu, which is "only 32 cm" in the Rhine, a boat with water at about 1 meter is still unobstructed.

Rhine at normal water level. Figure ｜ Figure insect creativity

However, commercial traffic is another matter. A typical modern Rhine Rhine River ship is usually 110 meters long, 11 meters wide, full load 3,000 tons, and about 3 meters of water. When the water depth is insufficient, you can only use a way to reduce the loading to avoid stinging the riverbed.

A spokesman for HGK, Germany, located in Duisburg's largest inland ship transport company, said: "In early March, the ship can also load 2,200 tons", and now it can only load 600 tons. Decreasing means that transporting the same cargo requires three times the number of transportation times, and the pushed transportation cost makes the German economy that was already in trouble.

The Rhine, which originated in the Alps, is a 1230 -kilometer -long international river. It has 865 kilometers long in Germany and has been called the "Der Vater Rhein" of Germany since ancient times.

The Rhine is one of the busiest rivers in Europe,

It may be forced to "reduce the burden" now.

The Rhine has built the golden business lines of ancient European and modern European industrial development due to the relatively low cost of water transportation. In recent years, it has been sought after by environmental protection people because of its relatively low carbon inland shipping (a inland ship can replace about 150 trucks).

Last year, the inland shipping transported nearly 200 million tons of goods for Germany, accounting for about 7%of the country's total transportation. The supply of steel, petroleum and chemical factories in the lower reaches of the Rhein River depends on the sails to provide raw materials and fuel.

The German economy is in a perfect storm

The cause of the Rhine's water level crisis is undoubtedly the big drought of "one encounter in five hundred years". According to Cai Yingning, a senior engineer in China Central Meteorological Channel, "Recently, the northern hemisphere has extremely strong high -pressure high -pressure high -pressure, almost around the earth for a week" (I believe everyone has experienced it these days).

The feeling in the high pressure ring is a word: heat.

In Europe, the high pressure of the subtropical high pressure is superimposed with the high pressure of the mainland. Under the influence of factors such as the atmospheric and clear air radiation, sinking temperature, and heating flow conveying, large -scale sustainable high temperature weather has occurred.

This summer, so far,

The temperature in most parts of Europe and North America is higher than the normal temperature in previous years.

(Figure: SWE)

However, this kind of so -called "one hundred years of encounter" special meteorological environment, the Rhine has experienced three times in the past five years: last year's heavy water, drought this year, and the lowest water level since the Rhine River has its own hydrological records appeared in many places in many places. 2018.

Although it is close rather than the lowest water level record in 2018, there are three things that did not appear in 2018:

First, the epidemic of new crown pneumonia. The epidemic not only brings illness, but also caused the supply chain tension that has not yet been reduced.

Second, Russia and Ukraine conflict. European and American countries' sanctions on Russia and Russia's countermeasures have caused Germany to be in the energy crisis before this drought.

After some operations on Russia, I first put myself out of energy.

Third, the minimum water level in most areas in 2018 appeared in autumn, but now it has just until mid -August. If the climax of the drought this year also appears in autumn (the lowest water level in the town of Kobu is 25 cm and appears in October 2018), the severity will be unimaginable by then. 30%of Germany's crude oil and coal transportation rely on inland river shipping,

80%of the transport volume in the inland shipping is on the Rhine.

(The drought in 2018 forced the shipping to be suspended: PHYS)

Mark Shatenberg, an economist of Deutsche Bank Research Department, believes: "This time the low water level appeared earlier ... If this situation (compared to 2018), it will last longer, and the economic loss will be more serious." According to the Department of the Research Department Data in 2018 led to a decrease in German GDP by 0.2%.

These three influences, the German economy, which is "leaking in the middle of the night", may fall into a "perfect storm", which is enough to compare with the "oil shock" in the 1970s.

Schneider, chief economist at Germany, said: "The growth rate in 2022 should be only 1.2%. If the water level continues to decline, the growth may also drop to less than one percent." In addition, according to the Bonn University and IFO Institute of Economics Research Institute According to the report, if Russia completely interrupted the natural gas supply to Germany later this year, Germany's GPD would decrease by 0.5%to 3%.

Living straw of German Energy

Among the various crises caused by the drought, the most closely contacted by the German people was the energy crisis.

During the low water level of the Rhine in 2018, the ship could only load 300 tons of goods. Gas stations in some areas had to be closed due to lack of oil. Today, the low water level that has continued for several weeks has affected the power generation operation of two German coal -fired power plants. If the drought continues, the coal -fired power plant in the Baden Fu Tengbao area may be closed due to the lack of coal.

Originally, in order to cope with the threat of Russia's "air break", the German Economic Minister Habeck (the Green Party) just formulated a plan to re -start coal power generation in the crisis time in July this year. Both the results.

(Figure: DW)

Nowadays, when residents have high energy costs, the increase in water in coal has increased sharply, which may affect the established plan of Habeck, which will make the sound of "renewing life" on the German nuclear power on the field of public opinion again.

As early as the age of Merkel, the Alliance Party has always been opposed to the abandonment of the inside of the nuclear power. Merkel himself has also agreed to "probation" for nuclear power and perform specific political operations. However, Fukushima Nuclear Power in Japan The accident caused the German people's conditions to completely turn to shutting down the nuclear power as soon as possible, so that the Alliance Party had abandoned it.

Today, as the Alliance Party in the Wild Party, the Liberal Democratic Party, which is also dissatisfied with the "abandonment of nuclear", may be contacted within the pressure brought by the public sentiment caused by the energy crisis.

If the inland coal shipping is forced to be suspended due to drought, what else is there in Germany?

not at all.

The reason why the Rhine is called "Golden Waterway" is because the comprehensive cost of inland shipping is the lowest.

From the end of June this year, the freight will rise steadily.

Some ports of ports even rose vertically.

The same cost -effective railway freight may be an alternative, but the investment and construction cycle of the railway is very long. In recent decades, German railway investment has mainly focused on high -profile passenger transportation, and it has not invested enough in modernized freight.

On the one hand, Germany hopes that by 2030, the business mileage of the passenger railway will be doubled.

On the other hand, the government also hopes to increase the railway freight market share from 18%to 25%by 2030.

(2013 to 2025 railway freight share, of which 2022 to 2025 is the forecast value,

The target of 25%is far from the map: STATISCA)

What is urgent to solve is the trucks and tankers on the highway. However, since the new crown pneumonia's epidemic, the global supply chain has been in a tight state, and Germany is naturally no exception, so highway capacity has long been saturated. According to Germany's recruitment website, the transportation company urgently recruited 50,000 professional drivers before the drought.

Due to the poor treatment of truck drivers, many active drivers are almost retired.

So in fact, the shortage of the truck driver is not a matter of two days,

The epidemic and drought have exacerbated this phenomenon.

(Reference: indeed)

On the one hand, the shipping workers are about to be unemployed, and the other is the lack of road transportation. It seems that although the inland shipping is "a million tank workers and foods", it seems that it is better to let the sailors go ashore to drive.

This is a drought that swept the world, and our Yangtze River is also experiencing a rare "flood season." China can use this crisis to observe the response methods of various countries, especially the experience of the Rhine Basin in the international river management.

The third largest tributary of the Yangtze River is almost "dry".

(Figure: Xinhuanet)

Reference materials:

1.Unternehmen stellen sich wegen Rheinkrise auf das Schlimmste ein, https://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/rhein-grosse-chemieanlagen-wegen-niedrigwasser-vor-der-abschaltung-18247662.html.2.Birger Nicolai , Was passiert, wenn Schiffe nicht mehr fahren können? 7 Fakten zum Rhein-Niedrigwasser, 12.08.2022,https://www.welt.de/wirtschaft/article240446345/Duerre-Sieben-Fakten-zum-Rhein-Niedrigwasser.html.

3.Niedrigwasser: Rhein-Pegel in Emmerich fällt auf Rekordtief von vier Zentimetern,https://www.handelsblatt.com/politik/deutschland/duerre-niedrigwasser-rhein-pegel-in-emmerich-faellt-auf-rekordtief-von- vier-ZENTIMETERN/28600304.html.

4.https://wwwwwww.spiegel.de/panorama/duerre-in-deerschland-ausgetrocknete-seen-frachtschiffe-mit-wenig-tiefgang-am-am-295-465555D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-A0D2-E9E9-A0D29 -E-A-A-th-th-th-twen-m-fi's A-family-De that-that

5. --Fotos-32617812.html.

6. Bao Xuelin: "Risks of the Rhine's Water Position Decreasing Downswalked Risks of Economy", Xinhuanet, August 12, 2022, http://www.news.cn/world/2022-08/12/c_1211675353.htm.

7. China Meteorological News: "Affected by extreme high temperature and drought -how does the European" Lifeline "Rhine's rush of drought in the rivers of the rivers get out of trouble?" ", August 16, 2022, http://www.qxkp.net/zxfw/zxdt/202208/t20220816_5035358.html.

8/Martin Arnold: "The German Economy Enlies" Perfect Storm ", triggers concerns about recession," Financial Times ", August 16, 2022, https://dbdzmnhotmzi1.cloudfront.net/interactive/80476? Exclusive.

9.Lex column: "Drought in the Yangtze River Basin Push China to Coal Electric", https://dbdzmnhotmzi1.Cloudfront.net/premium/001097006? Exclusive.

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