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by Chris Roberts
“Human-caused climate change” is “very likely” one of the chief causes of California’s ongoing drought,
according to a study released Monday.
“Concentrations” of “modern greenhouse gas” are keeping away the storms that normally bring the rain and snow that fill up the state’s reservoirs every winter, according to findings from a research team led by Stanford University climate scientist Noah Diffenbaugh, the school announced Monday.
The drought, which is about to enter its fourth year, is one of the driest periods ever recorded in California.
The Tuolumne River, which supplies San Francisco and other Bay Area cities with drinking water, is at its lowest-ever flow since 1776, and conditions are the driest recorded in the past 97 years, when hydrology record-keeping began, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission reported last week.
Scientists have dubbed the barrier of high pressure that’s steering storms away from California the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge.” This ridge kept snow away during the 2013 and 2014 rainy seasons.
High-pressure fronts like this are three times as likely to form in the presence of the human-caused carbon emissions put into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, Diffenbaugh’s team found.
Other high-pressure barriers have formed and then eventually vanished. This particular ridge has refused to dissipate, and has steered precipitation that would normally fall on California to Alaska and other points north.
The drought has already cost the California economy $2.2 billion and 17,000 jobs. All 58 counties have been declared disaster zones, and Gov. Jerry Brown has called on Californians to cut their water use by 20 percent.
So far, San Francisco water users have managed to meet the 10 percent call for conservation made by Mayor Ed Lee in January.
But if the drought continues or if the winter brings moderate rainfall, conservation is likely to continue or to be doubled next year, the SFPUC said last week.
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by Chris Roberts“Human-caused climate change” is “very likely” one of the chief causes of California’s ongoing drought, according to a study released Monday.
“Concentrations” of “modern greenhouse gas” are keeping away the storms that normally bring the rain and snow that fill up the state’s reservoirs every winter, according to findings from a research team led by Stanford University climate scientist Noah Diffenbaugh, the school announced Monday.
The drought, which is about to enter its fourth year, is one of the driest periods ever recorded in California.
The Tuolumne River, which supplies San Francisco and other Bay Area cities with drinking water, is at its lowest-ever flow since 1776, and conditions are the driest recorded in the past 97 years, when hydrology record-keeping began, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission reported last week.
Scientists have dubbed the barrier of high pressure that’s steering storms away from California the “Ridiculously Resilient Ridge.” This ridge kept snow away during the 2013 and 2014 rainy seasons.
High-pressure fronts like this are three times as likely to form in the presence of the human-caused carbon emissions put into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, Diffenbaugh’s team found.
Other high-pressure barriers have formed and then eventually vanished. This particular ridge has refused to dissipate, and has steered precipitation that would normally fall on California to Alaska and other points north.
The drought has already cost the California economy $2.2 billion and 17,000 jobs. All 58 counties have been declared disaster zones, and Gov. Jerry Brown has called on Californians to cut their water use by 20 percent.
So far, San Francisco water users have managed to meet the 10 percent call for conservation made by Mayor Ed Lee in January.
But if the drought continues or if the winter brings moderate rainfall, conservation is likely to continue or to be doubled next year, the SFPUC said last week.
link