CNN
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In parts of a Spanish tourist hotspot, tap water has become so salty it is undrinkable, leaving residents and visitors queuing for bottled or tanked drinking water as the region struggles with a severe and prolonged drought.

Several towns on the Costa Blanca – a more than 160-kilometer-long stretch of Mediterranean coastline in the southeastern province of Alicante – are affected because their vital underground water reserves are shrinking due to a lack of rain.

The falling groundwater level provides space for the ingress of seawater, which leads to the contamination of drinking water.

The problem has been going on for months. In March, the authority responsible for water management in the region for the Júcar River Basin declared that parts of Alicante were experiencing “an exceptional period of drought”.

But the crisis has worsened in the summer as the influx of tourists has increased the demand for water for both drinking and recreation. According to Reuters, there are about 38,000 swimming pools in the region, or about one for every five residents, Reuters reported, citing the National Statistics Institute.

In the municipality of Teulada-Moraira – which has a population of around 12,000 but whose population can increase fivefold in the summer months – local authorities declared tap water undrinkable in August after months of rising salinity.

In June, one of the wells was found to have a salt content ten times higher than usual.

Local authorities have now installed drinking water tanks at distribution points, each of which provides citizens with up to 20 litres of water per week.

In nearby El Poble Nou de Benitatxell, authorities announced in June that the town was in a “very serious situation” with high salinity in drinking water “after having experienced no rainfall deficit in the last two years.”

This month, the city’s mayor declared the tap water undrinkable and advised people not to drink it or use it for cooking or preparing food. Authorities are currently distributing free bottled water to residents.

“This situation will remain the same until weather conditions change and allow aquifers to be recharged or the high demand for water in summer subsides,” Miguel Ángel García Buigues, the city’s mayor, said in a statement in mid-August.

But it is unlikely that there will be any relief for at least several weeks. No widespread rain is forecast in the short term, said José Ángel Núñez Mora, a climatologist at AEMET, the Spanish national weather service. The rains will not Temperatures typically continue to fall until October, he told CNN.

Even if it rains, a lot of rain will be needed to replenish water reserves.

In Marina Alta, the region of Alicante where the affected towns are located, there has been less than a quarter of the amount of rain normally expected. “There is no precedent for a 12-month period as dry as the current one,” said Núñez Mora.

The unusual heat in the region has also contributed to the crisis, an example of “compound extremes” that are becoming increasingly common due to human-induced climate change, he added.

This part of Spain is generally used to droughts and has adapted to them, said Núñez Mora, but “when the droughts are very intense and last for a long time, the effects are more far-reaching… the impacts are also felt on water resources for human use.”

Other parts of Spain are also struggling with severe and prolonged drought.

A state of emergency was declared in the northeastern region of Catalonia in February, leading to restrictions on water supplies for agriculture, industry and leisure.

Last year, a drought and a record-breaking heatwave shrank Catalonia’s reservoirs, with one sinking to levels so low that a medieval village that had been submerged when the lake was created in the 1960s emerged from the lake’s waters. dried out bed.

Extreme heat and persistent drought are becoming the new reality for parts of Spain and other countries in Europe, a continent that is warming faster than any other region.