Concordat Water Deal Holds, But Reservoirs Keep Slipping

GENEVA — The water compact the Global Concordat Council hammered out after its 22 July emergency session is holding on paper, but the reservoirs it was meant to steady are still falling. The Oceanic & Atmospheric Assembly reported that storage across the three worst-hit basins slipped again through the last fortnight, and the desalination throughput meant to backstop them is running behind schedule. "The agreement bought us order, not water," Secretary-General Ingrid Halvorsen told delegates, urging patience as Tethys Hydrous Group ramps new capacity. In Phoenix, where municipal rationing entered its ninth week, plant operator Deborah Cole said her crews are treating brine faster than at any point on record and still losing ground to the heat. With the registered climate-migrant count now past 112 million — many moving because the water moved first — the compact's real test is not the vote that made it but the summer that follows. The Assembly's next basin bulletin is due within the week.