Me and Global Warming

According to most definitions, I now live in a desert.

We normally have around twenty inches of rain in a year. Occasional vigorous rainfalls have given us more than twenty inches in a day. Last year we had less than three inches of rain, one inch of it last January.

In the little valley in which I live, this time of year the native grasses (okay, weeds, if you want to be that way) are eight to twelve inches high and a beautiful green. Right now, they are non-existent. The ground is exactly as it is in the summer: brown and dry.

The coming fire season may prove to be more exciting than I would prefer.

Do you think we would get some rain if I joined the Republican Party? They don't seem to have any problems with climate change.

Best way to get rain is to wash your car, or pour a cement pad.

Tries the car washing. Didn't work.
Cement pads blow away in the wind. Maybe a concrete pad. I could use a basketball court.

Addendum:

Just saw some data that shows the previous low rainfall record in California was in 1898. 2013's rainfall was just over half of 1898's rainfall.

Bummer.

What are you, some kind of librul commie?

No. I'm a dry commie.

Also a hot commie. (Is that the name of a drink? If not, it should be.)

Things just continue getting worse. Twice in the last week, I've had to turn on the air conditioner in the house. In the middle of fucking January! The daytime temperatures here have been running about thirty degrees above normal for the past month or two. Funny thing is that the low temps are about normal. Strange.

Yet, on Fox News, they say that the extreme cold in the east is proof that global warming is a hoax. My god, I hate those people. Can we set up a fund to hire a sniper?

You think it's bad now, wait until this summer when you won't have the normal snowpack to supply water.

NoCoPilot wrote:

You think it's bad now, wait until this summer when you won't have the normal snowpack to supply water.

The snowpack is about twenty percent of normal. Some of the local reservoir levels are in single digits, one of them below one percent. There's a lake in town that has never had a real problem with water level. Now it has fallen so low that last week they were using bulldozers to scrape up the dead fish.

I'm starting to think it wasn't wise of me to buy a house in an area that is classified "Extreme Fire Hazard" (under normal circumstances).

_Howard wrote:

I'm starting to think it wasn't wise of me to buy a house in an area that is classified "Extreme Fire Hazard" (under normal circumstances).

Tile roof?

Concrete roof.

After I moved in, I replaced the wood siding with a non-flammable concrete-based siding. Unfortunately, heat convection from a wild fire still warms up the wood frame and the wood decks, and the fat-based people.

Have any relatives on the East Coast? Have them mail you some snow.

My daughter lives in New York. What do you think, NoCo, UPS or FedEx?

Better go for Next Day.

Let's see...four billion cubic feet of snow, next-day delivery... Damn. Their website won't estimate that. Have to give them a call, I guess. I'm just afraid their packaging requirements will be a problem.

You're screwed.

Quote :

Water shortages, devastating wildfires, and growing economic impacts: All could be on the way unless more precipitation arrives, and fast. Here are some scary realities about the drought:

1. It's Bordering on Unprecedented in Some Areas. According to Christopher Burt, weather historian at Weather Underground, the City of San Francisco has received only 2.12 inches of water so far in this water year. The driest water year on record was from 1850-1851, at 7.42 inches. So as of now, San Francisco is below half of the all-time record low.

2. Time in the Rainy Season is Running Out. California doesn't get steady rain all year round. Rather, it has a rainy season each year, and we're currently in it. Typically, the rainy season runs through March; if major precipitation doesn't arrive by then, it probably won't be coming. Granted, this is also the chief source of hope right now: California can sometimes get plenty of water in February and March.

3. The Drought Could Lead to Dirtier Energy Use. Peter Gleick, president of the Oakland-based Pacific Institute, points out one less-noticed consequence of the drought: The lack of water means less available hydropower. And that has consequences: "Because renewable hydropower is among the cheapest and most versatile of electricity sources," writes Gleick, "California ratepayers will have to pay for more costly fossil fuels to make up for the difference." The result, he notes, is likely to be "billions of dollars in added energy costs and generating more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere."

4. It's Setting the Stage for a Devastating Fire Season. Hotter, drier conditions favor wildfires. Indeed, California has already seen several significant fires since the October 31 end of the traditional fire season, including December's Big Sur fire and the ongoing Colby Fire in the Los Angeles area. That's a bad sign. So is the fact that in just the first 11 days of January, the state saw 154 fires that burned 598 acres. That's way above the five-year average for this time of year.

For California, seven of the 10 largest fires in state history have occurred since the year 2000. And if these dry conditions persist throughout 2014, another new fire may be added to that list.

5. It Could Pummel Agriculture. California is an agricultural powerhouse. For crops, the state accounts for 15 percent of national sales and for livestock, 7.1 percent, according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture. But now farmers are likely to have considerably less water. This won't lead to agricultural collapse, but it will definitely take a toll. "There will be, in agriculture, fewer plantings, fewer harvests, and revenue of seasonal crops," says UC-Merced's Roger Bales. "There could be more expensive pumping of groundwater. And there could be just lower yields if they have less water to apply."

6. It's a Sign of What's to Come. NOAA's seasonal drought outlook projects persistent or worsening conditions in California through April. Over the longer term, climate projections suggest that this risk will continue or increase. According to the draft National Climate Assessment, the US Southwest—which includes California and five other states—can expect less precipitation, hotter temperatures, and drier soils in the future, meaning that by 2060, there could be as much as a 35-percent increase in water demand. Along with that comes a 25- to 50-percent increased risk of water shortages.

So even if California gets some much needed rain in the coming months, that'll only be a short-term reprieve. Right now, the state needs to engage in some major climate adaptation planning, to get ready for a much drier future.

http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2014/01/california-drought-scary-facts-snowpack

Oh, thanks so much for that. I feel much better now.

To make things even worse locally, in the past couple of decades a lot of vineyards have been put in here. So we now have many thousands of acres of (to me) useless agriculture rapidly depleting the ground water.

Have you considered wrapping your house?

Right. And that's just what we would look like after the fire blows through.   

Eat some bread, celery, onion and chicken soup before you go to bed.

I hate stuffing.