In some ways, this is a grimly familiar tale. After decades of relentless development, in which environmental concerns seldom registered, Urmia's fate can quite closely resemble that of the Aral Sea, of Bolivia's Lake Poopo, or an array of other once impressive, now much-reduced bodies of water. "It's kind of simple. The water withdrawal for human use increased tremendously at the same time as there was an extended drought," says Ali Mirchi, an assistant professor in the department of biosystems and agricultural engineering at Oklahoma State University, who has intensively studied the lake.
