Unlike early 2023, when nonstop atmospheric river storms built a deep Sierra Nevada snowpack, replenished depleted reservoirs and flooded parts of California, snowfall and rain is sharply diminished so far this year. But state water officials say there is plenty of winter left to accumulate more snow and precipitation.
Investments geared toward combating climate change and transitioning away from fossil fuels are among the items on the chopping block as California Gov. Gavin Newsom seeks to close a $37.9-billion budget deficit.
River basins around the world that were once regularly snowbound are increasingly seeing their snowpack shrink and climate change is to blame, a new study found. “Many of the world’s most populous basins are hovering on the precipice of rapid snow declines,” concluded the study of snow amounts since 1981 in Wednesday’s journal Nature.
Even as winter arrived in the East this week, with treacherous snow and an impending Arctic cold snap, much of the West and its major river basins are still entrenched in warm and dry conditions. It’s a sluggish start to what should be the region’s wet season and is raising concerns about the future of the water supplies that depend on it.
California has officially entered the era of climate-driven economic insecurity. On Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom laid out his new budget, facing a nearly $38-billion shortfall. That missing money is mostly due to lower-than-expected tax revenue on capital gains — the stock and investment earnings of the Golden State’s wealthiest folks weren’t quite what were expected.
This week may seem unusually cold for Southern California, but climate scientists say December 2023 was the month that truly had extraordinary temperatures – on the warm side.
California, Arizona and others, fearing a political shake-up of negotiating teams after the November election, are aiming to wrap up work this year. The states that rely on the Colorado River, which is shrinking because of climate change and overuse, are rushing to agree on a long-term deal to share the dwindling resource by the end of the year. They worry that a change in administrations after the election could set back talks.
After a worryingly weak start to the winter for California’s mountains, two storms — including what’s expected to be the biggest of the season so far — are expected to dump several inches of snow on the Sierra Nevada this week, days after some promising weekend snowfall.
Water, the stuff of life, behaves differently than most other matter in our universe: as it cools to take its solid form, it expands. This thermodynamic fact (called anomalous density) affords water the power to split solid granite. Water has also proven capable of dividing sovereign nations states, and tribes. The water in the Colorado River is performing this function right now.
One liter of water, equivalent to two standard-size bottled waters, contained an average of 240,000 plastic particles. These particles belonged to seven different types of plastics, with 90 per cent identified as nanoplastics and the remaining as microplastics, the details were found in a study, as per a report.
