Increase in sea surface temperature with global warming has an impact on coastal upwelling. Past two decades (1988 to 2007) of satellite observed sea surface temperatures and space borne scatterometer measured winds have provided an insight into the dynamics of coastal upwelling in the southeastern Arabian Sea, in the global warming scenario. These high resolution data products have shown inconsistent variability with a rapid rise in sea surface temperature between 1992 and 1998 and again from 2004 to 2007. The upwelling indices derived from both sea surface temperature and wind have shown that there is an increase in the intensity of upwelling during the period 1998 to 2004 than the previous decade. These indices have been modulated by the extreme climatic events like El-Nino and Indian Ocean Dipole that happened during 1991-92 and 1997-98. A considerable drop in the intensity of upwelling was observed concurrent with these events. Apart from the impact of global warming on the upwelling, the present study also provides an insight into spatial variability of upwelling along the coast. Noticeable fact is that the intensity of offshore Ekman transport off 8 o N during the winter monsoon is as high as that during the usual upwelling season in summer monsoon. A drop in the meridional wind speed during the years 2005, 2006 and 2007 has resulted in extreme decrease in upwelling though the zonal wind and the total wind magnitude are a notch higher than the previous years. This decrease in upwelling strength has resulted in reduced productivity too.
The United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal Life Below Water (SDG-14) aims to “conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas, and marine resources for sustainable development”. Within SDG-14, targets 14.1 and 14.2 deal with marine pollution and the adverse impacts of human activities on aquatic systems. Here, we present a remote-sensing-based analysis of short-term changes in the Vembanad-Kol wetland system in the southwest of India. The region has experienced high levels of anthropogenic pressures, including from agriculture, industry, and tourism, leading to adverse ecological and socioeconomic impacts with consequences not only for achieving the targets set out in SDG-14, but also those related to water quality (SDG-6) and health (SDG-3). To move towards the sustainable management of coastal and aquatic ecosystems such as Lake Vembanad, it is important to understand how both natural and anthropogenic processes affect water quality. In 2020, a unique opportunity arose to study water quality in Lake Vembanad during a period when anthropogenic pressures were reduced due to a nationwide lockdown in response to the global pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 (25 March–31 May 2020). Using Sentinel-2 and Landsat-8 multi-spectral remote sensing and in situ observations to analyse changes in five different water quality indicators, we show that water quality improved in large areas of Lake Vembanad during the lockdown in 2020, especially in the more central and southern regions, as evidenced by a decrease in total suspended matter, turbidity, and the absorption by coloured dissolved organic matter, all leading to clearer waters as indicated by the Forel-Ule classification of water colour. Further analysis of longer term trends (2013–2020) showed that water quality has been improving over time in the more northern regions of Lake Vembanad independent of the lockdown. The improvement in water quality during the lockdown in April–May 2020 illustrates the importance of addressing anthropogenic activities for the sustainable management of coastal ecosystems and water resources.
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