dirk meier is in his element - water, that is. here, in northern germany's spreewald, mr. makes his living running hotels and a harbor for boats. the area attracts many tourists. but mr. meier knows: the spreewald is changing. we can't forget that for the past fifty, sixty years, we've been lucky. there were no water shortages. if anything, we had too much. those times are over. in 2019, water levels receded in the spreewald. canals and rivers dried up. at the time, it was an exception - caused by the heat and lack of rain. but experts like ingolf arnold warn: this could be the future of the spreewald. if we don't do anything, the entire system will collapse, majorly impacting the spreewald. the reason lies in the brown coalfield right next door. open-pit mining here involves digging out huge pits and pumping out enormous volumes of groundwater. this used to end up in the spree. but germany is putting an end to brown coal, meaning no more pumping. and - no more groundwater to feed the spree. once we stop mining coal and stop pumping out groundwater, we will just have to liv

dirk meier is in his element - water, that is. here, in northern germany's spreewald, mr. makes his living running hotels and a harbor for boats. the area attracts many tourists. but mr. meier knows: the spreewald is changing. we can't forget that for the past fifty, sixty years, we've been lucky. there were no water shortages. if anything, we had too much. those times are over. in 2019, water levels receded in the spreewald. canals and rivers dried up. at the time, it was an exception - caused by the heat and lack of rain. but experts like ingolf arnold warn: this could be the future of the spreewald. if we don't do anything, the entire system will collapse, majorly impacting the spreewald. the reason lies in the brown coalfield right next door. open-pit mining here involves digging out huge pits and pumping out enormous volumes of groundwater. this used to end up in the spree. but germany is putting an end to brown coal, meaning no more pumping. and - no more groundwater to feed the spree. once we stop mining coal and stop pumping out groundwater, we will just have to liv