Tag: climate change

Don’t Count on El Niño to End the Drought

El Niño is back in the news, much as it was last year at this time. But this year, El Niño conditions in the tropical Pacific have intensified, and some climate scientists think the outcome this winter could be the return of much-needed rain. Hopeful media reports are describing the growing El Niño as a potential drought buster.

How solid are these predictions and should we count on a wet winter? Unfortunately, El Niño is an unreliable predictor of winter storminess. Although some of our wettest years have occurred during El Niño events, some very dry years have also occurred.

El Niño is the name given to a climatic pattern that originates in the Pacific tropics, and involves both the ocean and the atmosphere. It is defined by unusually warm upper-ocean waters in the central and eastern tropical Pacific, and is linked to slackened trade winds. El Niño conditions usually persist for several months and recur, irregularly, roughly every two to seven years. El Niño (and its opposite phase, a cool tropical Pacific condition known as La Niña) is Earth’s strongest and most important short-term climate variation because of its global reach: it disturbs climate and ecosystems in the tropics but also unleashes altered atmospheric patterns well beyond the tropics.

One of the regions it affects, usually during the winter, is California. Some El Niño events are strong enough to impact the North Pacific jet stream, which steers winter storms into California. Because the bulk of our seasonal precipitation occurs in a handful of strong winter storms the additional El Niño events make a big difference to the state’s water supply.

But El Niño often produces strong regional differences in precipitation. In many El Niño years, Southern California can be unusually wet, but the state’s important water supply areas in Northern California are often not—sometimes they are even unusually dry. When this happens, the water supply benefits of El Niño are limited. What’s more, in some El Niño years the entire state remains dry. The figure below shows how widely precipitation can range, with or without El Niño.

So why are climate scientists so energized about El Niño this summer?

El Niño conditions, once established, tend to last for several months. Beginning this spring and continuing through this summer, scientists have observed unusual heat build-up in the upper layers of the tropical Pacific. Climate models are pointing to a moderate to strong El Niño through the summer and into the fall. But summer and early fall are the dry season in California, and El Niño conditions at this time will not make much of a difference in the ongoing drought. These same models indicate that El Niño conditions are likely to persist into the coming winter, which is key to shifting the jet stream and increasing the number of winter storms. Historically, unusually strong El Niño events have been linked to record wet years in California. Two of the wettest water years on record in the state—1983 and 1998—occurred during very powerful El Niño conditions. So while the warmth this year is impressive, so far the 2015 El Niño is not in the same league as the extraordinary cases of 1983 and 1998, and the uncertainties over its intensity into next winter remain considerable.

As tempting as it is to hope this El Niño will take us off the hook for planning for a fifth year of drought, it would be unwise to bet on this, given the uncertainties. With reservoirs and groundwater at historic low levels after four consecutive dry, warm years, a single wet year is unlikely to erase the drought. Rather, it is prudent to plan now for continued impacts of our long dry spell. Major relief would be a pleasant surprise, but for now, continuing our efforts to conserve will pay off even if the hard rains come.

Chart note: This graph shows annual winter precipitation in the Sierra Nevada in relation to the Southern Oscillation Index, a measure of El Niño. Typically, the more negative the value, the stronger the El Niño, with greater global impacts on weather.

Chart source: California Department of Water Resources (precipitation); National Weather Service, Climate Prediction Center: Monthly Atmospheric Indices ( <ahref=”http: www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov=”” data=”” indices=”” soi”=”” target=”_blank”>Southern Oscillation Index). Modified from a graphic provided by Western Regional Climate Center.

A Dry Run for a Dry Future

During times of extreme water scarcity it is hard to find the silver lining. Yet the severity of this drought, including its record warm temperatures, is benefiting us in one way: it is a window into what droughts may look like in the future and gives us something to plan for—a target, if you will.

The state’s system of water rights laws and water supply infrastructure is built around managing periodic droughts. The design of this system reflects the climate conditions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as well as a much smaller population than we have today. Climate models and current observations indicate that we are facing an increasingly different future, one where warm droughts like our current one are no longer the rare exception.

It is crucial that we study our dry years closely. Like past cases, this drought has seen strong rainfall deficits. For four consecutive years (so far), the state has been dry to critically dry, with the driest calendar year on record in 2013. But recent studies have shown that while it has been unusually dry, the precipitation numbers of this drought fall within the realm of natural variability.

What is most unusual about this drought is its exceptional warmth. Statewide, three of the past four winters have been substantially warmer than the long-term average. The past two winters set records that were 4-5 degrees F above average. With this exceptional warmth, California experienced record low snowpack, since much precipitation fell as rain rather than snow and the lean snowpack melted rapidly.

The causes of this drought are being studied and debated by climatologists and oceanographers. Emerging research suggests that this drought may be linked, partially, to very warm waters in the far western tropical Pacific. Heat and moisture pumped into the atmosphere from these waters influence winds and storm tracks in the North Pacific, altering climate patterns in our region.

These teleconnections appear to have created the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge, an anomalous high pressure feature that camped over the waters off the West Coast and pushed North Pacific storms far to the north. This ridge, with its associated weak winds and unusual weather across the eastern Pacific, created The Blob: an area of very warm water stretching from the Bering Sea to Baja California. This blob has disrupted our marine ecosystems, harming fish, sea birds and marine mammals.

Onshore from all of this activity, winter storms that made it off the Pacific Ocean and into California were much fewer than normal. And those that did make it tended to be warm, reflecting conditions in the eastern Pacific, leaving us with rain instead of snow.

To date, there has been no definitive link that implicates this drought as a symptom of climate change. However, the consecutive years of dryness coupled with high temperatures strongly resemble the kind of droughts that are projected under the warmer climate during the latter half of this century. While the origins of future droughts may not be precisely the same, the on-the-ground results are likely to be.

Difficult as it is to endure, this drought provides important lessons. It is a useful and instructive test of how we manage water now—and how we will be forced to manage water in the future. As it unfolds, it tests the resiliency of California’s water infrastructure—made up of dams, aqueducts, and groundwater basins—along with our management systems and institutions. The drought is providing a preview of the warmer conditions during dry spells that will inevitably occur in future decades. As such, it is unveiling future challenges in managing the environment, including conserving our declining native biodiversity.

In short, this drought has revealed what a warmer climate future looks like. We should learn from it and plan accordingly.

Drought Watch: Crises as Catalyst for Policy Change

This is part of a continuing series on the impact of the drought.

Today Governor Brown signed three bills that require portions of the state to start managing groundwater sustainably. These bills are historic. Until today, California was the only western state that did not regulate groundwater, typically the source of more than one-third of the state’s supply, and much more during dry years.

Why, after a century of failing to address much-needed reform, has the state finally acted on this problem? It’s the drought.

The problem of groundwater overuse is nothing new in California. Calls for reform began as far back as the early 1900s, when severe excess pumping in many groundwater basins began to cause problems. Chronic overdraft—taking more out of the ground than nature puts back in—has left many basins severely depleted.

When the current drought arrived and communities and farms turned to groundwater to make up for shortages in surface water supply, a century of neglect—the hydrologic equivalent of deficit spending—caught up with California. The groundwater that, managed well, should have been cheap and plentiful, became expensive and scarce, leading to an economic and social crisis. The well-publicized effects of unsustainable pumping include sinking ground, dry wells, crumbling canals and roads, intense competition to drill deeper (and more costly) wells, the fallowing of more than 410,000 acres of farmland, and losses of more than $2 billion in farm revenues and more than 17,000 farm-related jobs. These factors combined to create pressure to tackle what had been, up to now, off limits to reform.

In our 2011 book, Managing California’s Water: From Conflict to Reconciliation, we note that significant advances in state water policy are often tied to droughts and floods, along with the inevitable lawsuits that follow. Extreme events like the current drought reveal fundamental weaknesses in California’s water management policies and practices. Perhaps more importantly, they create pressure on government to respond.

This is the silver lining of water crises in California: they are often the way we get things done. (The comprehensive reform of flood management enacted in 2007 was spurred on by the graphic images of Hurricane Katrina two years earlier, for example.) Indeed, one strategy for advancing water management reform is to plan and prepare for the inevitable, and then take advantage of a crisis to push ahead on needed reforms.

This year’s groundwater package is indeed historic, but California still has a long way to go in improving the way it manages water. With our changing climate, we should expect more frequent droughts and floods (and lawsuits)—so there will be no shortage of opportunities to tackle other problems in the future.

Climate Change, Fracking, and Drought—Oh My!

Last week’s release of the PPIC Statewide Survey: Californians and the Environment prompted a discussion of several major policy issues under consideration in Sacramento. A panel convened by PPIC talked about the survey’s findings on climate change policy, particularly public attitudes toward a potential increase in gas prices when new regulations for transportation fuels begin next year.

PPIC research associate Sonja Petek set the stage for the panel discussion by presenting the survey findings. The panel included Assemblyman Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica); Anne Baker, a senior advisor at the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies; and Rob Lapsley, president of the California Business Roundtable. The panelists said they supported the goals of the state’s climate change policies. They encouraged a public education effort about the extension of the cap-and-trade program to transportation fuels. The survey found that most Californians also support the policy change, but support drops sharply if it means higher gas prices.

The panel was divided on the state’s approach to fracking, a controversial process for extracting underground oil. Bloom is the author of a bill calling for a moratorium on fracking. Lapsley described the economic benefit of having more in-state oil production. The survey found most Californians opposed to fracking.

The panel also discussed water policies and the drought. In the survey, Californians name water as the number one environmental issue this year, and a narrow majority of likely voters support an $11.1 billion bond that is scheduled for the November ballot. Support is higher for a lower bond amount, something that is under discussion in the Capitol.

Drought Watch: Roadblocks to Efficient Funding

This is part of a continuing series on the impact of the drought.

The drought has prompted California to redirect hundreds of millions of dollars of remaining state bond funds and other revenues to make the state more resilient in the future. These funds are certainly welcome, but it’s important to see this spending in perspective. As we show in a new PPIC report—written with a team of co-authors from other institutions—the contributions of state money are small change when it comes to spending on water. Most of the $30 billion spent annually to support California’s water system is raised by local and regional water agencies.

The good news is that California’s urban water and wastewater utilities are in relatively good fiscal health. Thanks to their significant investments to improve water supply reliability in the two decades since the last major drought, California’s major urban areas—and the state’s economy—will largely be able to weather this one. Crucially, these utilities have been able to make the needed investments by raising local water rates.

However, looming legal challenges may limit the ability of local agencies to make continued investments in modern, integrated water management—investments that would better prepare us for population growth, climate change, and future droughts. Proposition 218, a constitutional amendment adopted by the state’s voters in 1996, requires water bills to reflect the costs of service to each individual parcel. As some recent court cases have shown, a narrow interpretation of this requirement can present roadblocks to several important management tools:

  • Conservation pricing. Tiered pricing—which charges higher per gallon prices for larger amounts of water use—can promote conservation. And, because new water sources often cost more than existing supplies, higher-priced tiers are justified. But it is difficult to establish a precise link between the price paid and the amount of water saved at each property. As a result, these rate structures may be legally vulnerable even though they improve utilities’ ability to maintain reliable water service.
  • Use of new water sources. Non-traditional sources of water, such as recycled wastewater and stormwater, improve overall system reliability for existing customers, even if not all customers use those specific sources. But a recent trial court interpreted Proposition 218 to mean agencies could not charge customers for any part of water service (in this case, recycled water) that was not physically available to them.
  • Sustainable groundwater management. One promising way to stabilize California’s overtaxed groundwater basins is by charging a per gallon fee to limit pumping and to cover the costs of recharging basins with other supplies. But because groundwater overdraft doesn’t affect each parcel in exactly the same way, groundwater agencies have also faced court challenges regarding the legality of these fees.

To enable our water system to respond effectively to future droughts, the courts need to keep the entire water system in mind when responding to rate challenges. And over the longer term, California needs to better align its funding laws to the goals of modern water management. In a state where drought is a fact of life, this alignment will allow us to manage this crucial resource far into the future. Asking our water managers to account for the cost and location of each drop of water when developing their water rate structures will undermine recent momentum toward a more sophisticated and interconnected water system.

Californians Want the State to Lead

Californians have consistently supported their state government in making its own policies on national issues. Past PPIC Statewide Surveys have shown that residents want the state to address global warming, and they have also favored independent state action on health care. Now there is one more issue to add to the list: immigration. Our new survey shows that 58 percent support California acting on its own to improve the lives of undocumented immigrants in our state.

It is not surprising that Californians are looking to their state government to act on key issues like climate change, health care, and immigration. Residents increasingly view state government in a more positive light than the federal government. The governor’s job approval rating, which held steady for much of 2013, has now climbed to a record-high 58 percent. The legislature’s job approval rating, at 42 percent, is at a near-record high. In contrast, Congress’ rating—which fell to a record-low 18 percent in December—is now just 26 percent. And President Obama’s approval rating is near its lowest point, at 53 percent.

Californians are also optimistic that state elected officials can work together and accomplish a lot in the next year (57%), while far fewer hold this view of their federal leaders (37%).

California’s policymakers have been in sync with state residents. They’ve taken leadership on climate change, been proactive in implementing federal health care reform, and most recently enacted a series of laws affecting undocumented immigrants. In the last year, Governor Brown signed the Trust Act, which limits the criteria by which a local law enforcement agency can comply with federal deportation hold requests. He also signed bills allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain a California driver’s licenses and be admitted as attorneys. In doing so, Brown said, “While Washington waffles on immigration, California’s forging ahead.”

With few signs of gridlock easing at the federal level and one party in control in Sacramento, it will be interesting to see where else California decides to forge ahead.

Chart Source: PPIC Statewide Survey: Californians and Their Government, January 2014.