Prepare for Hotter and Drier Southwestern US, Climate Experts Urge

[Ed Barrow]

Two prominent climate experts, including one from the University of Arizona, are calling for a "no-regrets" strategy for planning for a hotter and drier western North America. Their advice: use water conservatively and continue developing ways to harness energy from the sun, wind and Earth.

Jonathan Overpeck, principal investigator with the Climate Assessment for the Southwest at the UA, and Bradley Udall, director of the Western Water Assessment at the University of Colorado, write in the June 25 issue of the journal Science that such an approach is necessary for coping with a wide range of projected future climate changes in the West and Southwest.

In their overview of shifting climate in the region, Overpeck and Udall cite published findings of prevalent signs of change: rising temperatures, earlier snowmelt, northward-shifting winter storms, increasing precipitation intensity and flooding, record-setting drought, plummeting Colorado River reservoir storage, widespread vegetation mortality and more large wildfires.

"The West, and especially the Southwest, is leading the nation in climate change -- warming, drying, less late-winter snowpack and drought -- as well as the impacts of this change," said Overpeck, a UA professor of geosciences and atmospheric sciences and co-director of the Institute of the Environment.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100625101145.htm

[msongs]

1. so cal high peaks still have snow on the northern sides nt

[haikugal]

2. Your point?

[petronius]

7. We got a good snowpack this year in CA, along with a cooler than normal

spring and early summer - it's been a welcome relief from this time last year (and the year before that). However, most every scenario I've seen for the next half-century suggests that these good years are tending to become less frequent, especially for the interior West...

[OKIsItJustMe]

3. See also…

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=251873&mesg_id=251873

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

4. In the desert?

I'd bet on it.

[classysassy]

5. Whew,here in southeastern arizona

the water in my pool is too hot for me to cool off. I put ice cubs in my dog's water bowl. If you want to Stay cool don't come to arizona.

[classysassy]

6. Cubs are not cool,thats cubes.

[Nihil]

9. I always thought that icebergs had calves ...? (n/t)

:hide:

[joshcryer]

8. Good for CSP, I suppose.

Bad for everything else.