Abstract
The Balearic Islands are a major Mediterranean tourist destination that features one of the greatest swimming pool densities within Europe. In this paper, standard meteorological data were combined with a diachronic swimming pool inventory to estimate water evaporation from swimming pools over the Balearic archipelago. Evaporation was estimated using an empirical equation designed for open-water surfaces. Results revealed a 32% increase in swimming pools’ water use by 2015. Evaporation from swimming pools added 9.6 L of water to touristic consumption per guest night and person, and represented 4.9% of the total urban water consumption. In 2015, almost 5 hm3 (5 billion L) were lost from pools across the Balearic Islands. In several densely urbanized areas, evaporative water loss from pools exceeded four million litres per square kilometre and year. The water needed to refill the total of 62,599 swimming pools and to counteract evaporative water loss is equivalent to 1.2 pools per year. Swimming pools have rapidly proliferated across the islands. We have expounded on this development in view of much-needed responsible water management across the islands.
Highlights
A diachronic analysis of the cadastral data on swimming pools revealed a decrease in the pool area constructed on the islands per year since 2009, most likely as a consequence of the financial and area constructed on the islands per year since 2009, most likely as a consequence of the financial and economic crisis of 2008
We argue that the first priority is to highlight and reveal the water consumption that is related to the latest tourism development trend in the Balearic Islands and the whole Mediterranean coast, namely the proliferation of irrigated lawns and swimming pools
Our work focused on water loss from swimming pools by evaporation in the highly touristic Balearic Islands over the last decade (2006–2015)
Summary
The Balearic archipelago (Figure 1) ranks top among the Spanish Mediterranean tourist zones for hotel-based sun and sea package tourists [1,2]. In 2015, 12.5 million tourist arrivals were recorded (IBESTAT 2017b) in this top touristic destination, which has a temperate climate and attractive beaches, good accessibility and massive touristic infrastructure, including hotels and a large airport. The tourist activity clashes with one of the most important socio-environmental issues of the territory: water scarcity [2,3,4]. Water 2018, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW Figure. Locationdensity densityand andsize sizeclass classdistribution distributionof ofswimming swimmingpools poolsin inthe theBalearic BalearicIslands.
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