We are getting hotter and drier here in the west. The New Normal is clearly starting. Where we end up is the open question.
As this and the recent article in the New York Times both illustrate the west is the epicenter of the change. It is the water or the lack of it that is most apparent. More so in the west than anywhere else. For those of us living out here, it has been the daily news for the last several years.
The real news is not these stories, it is the lack of noise on the impacts of a continued drought. What are the likely scenarios for the millions that depend on this water? What will happen to the local economies? What actions can we be taking now to make sure we could get through droughts a decade long, or longer. That we are experiencing a drought is old news. What we should be doing should be the news.
The west has experienced long droughts before. These are nothing new. It has caused major upheaval. A good read on the topic is A Great Aridness by Bill deBuys. We have time to start planning and investigating alternatives. But how much time is unknown.
With the Colorado River experiencing record low levels, the impact will be profound to tens of millions of people if it continues for much longer.
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A great snippet out of this article highlights this point:
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/08/12/2439931/reservoir-billboards-southwest/
As this and the recent article in the New York Times both illustrate the west is the epicenter of the change. It is the water or the lack of it that is most apparent. More so in the west than anywhere else. For those of us living out here, it has been the daily news for the last several years.
The real news is not these stories, it is the lack of noise on the impacts of a continued drought. What are the likely scenarios for the millions that depend on this water? What will happen to the local economies? What actions can we be taking now to make sure we could get through droughts a decade long, or longer. That we are experiencing a drought is old news. What we should be doing should be the news.
The west has experienced long droughts before. These are nothing new. It has caused major upheaval. A good read on the topic is A Great Aridness by Bill deBuys. We have time to start planning and investigating alternatives. But how much time is unknown.
With the Colorado River experiencing record low levels, the impact will be profound to tens of millions of people if it continues for much longer.
.
A great snippet out of this article highlights this point:
"The last 14 years on the Colorado River, she says, have been the driest years since records began being kept in the late 1800's, and based on tree ring studies among the driest 14 year periods in the last 1,200 years.
"If you say climate change doesn't have an impact, you're smoking something," Castle concludes.
The time for trying to prove we are in a record drought is over. It is time to start moving forward to a New Normal.http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/08/12/2439931/reservoir-billboards-southwest/
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