Guest Post by Bob Tisdale –
The National Science Foundation press release Cause of California drought linked to climate change found its way into the mainstream media, with science reporters around the globe adding their hype. That press release is based on the recently published study Swain et al. (2014) “The Extraordinary California Drought of 2013/2014: Character, Context and the Role of Climate Change”, which can be found in the Special Supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society (BAMS report)Vol. 95, No. 9, September 2014, Explaining Extreme Events of 2013 From A Climate Perspective.
I’ll publish a few comments about Swain et al. (2014) in a few days. But this post is not about that paper.
THE CALIFORNIA DROUGHT – WHO’S TO BLAME FOR THE LACK OF PREPAREDNESS?
As I was reading Anthony Watts excellent post about Swain et al. (2014), Claim: Cause of California drought linked to climate change – not one mention of ENSO or El Niño, a number of reoccurring thoughts replayed, thoughts that have struck me numerous times as the Western States drought unfolded last year and intensified this year.
Was California prepared for a drought?
Obviously, California was not prepared for a drought this intense, and the impacts of that lack of preparedness on California residents will grow much worse if the drought continues.
Why wasn’t California prepared for a short-term (multiyear) drought this intense?
The realistic blame should be the focus of climate science in general under the direction of the IPCC. In the opening paragraph of the IPCC’s History webpage, they state (my boldface and caps):
Today the IPCC’s role is as defined in Principles Governing IPCC Work, “…to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of HUMAN-INDUCED climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation.
The fact that the IPCC has focused all of their efforts on “understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change” is very important. The IPCC has never realistically tried to determine if natural factors could have caused most of the warming the Earth has experienced over the past century. For decades, they’ve worn blinders that blocked their views of everything other than the possible impacts of carbon dioxide. The role of the IPCC has always been to prepare reports that support the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions caused by the burning of fossil fuels. As a result, that’s where all of the research money goes. The decision to only study human-induced global warming is a political choice, not a scientific one. In efforts to justify agendas, politicians around the world jumped on the climate change stump and funded computer model-based studies of human-induced global warming…to the tune of billions of dollars annually.
Because of that political agenda, the latest and greatest climate models still cannot simulate the basic underlying processes that govern the naturally occurring, coupled ocean-atmosphere processes like ENSO (El Niños and La Niñas), like the Pacific Decadal Oscillation…processes that have strong influences on temperature and precipitation in west coast states. So there is no possible way climate models, as they exist today, could forecast what precipitation might be like in the future there. And that basic problem will persist until there is a redirection of climate-research funding. Yes, funding. Research follows the money.
What value do climate model-based studies provide?
None.
The paper Pierce et al. (2013) The Key Role of Heavy Precipitation Events in Climate Model Disagreements of Future Annual Precipitation Changes in California provides an overview of why the climate models have no value when it comes to forecasts like California drought. In their abstract Pierce et al. write (my boldface and caps):
Of the 25 downscaled model projections examined here, 21 agree that precipitation frequency will DECREASE by the 2060s, with a mean reduction of 6–14 days yr−1. This reduces California’s mean annual precipitation by about 5.7%. Partly offsetting this, 16 of the 25 projections agree that daily precipitation intensity will INCREASE, which accounts for a model average 5.3% increase in annual precipitation. Between these conflicting tendencies, 12 projections show drier annual conditions by the 2060s and 13 show wetter.
[Hat tip to blogger “Jimbo” on the WUWT thread Claim: Cause of California drought linked to climate change – not one mention of ENSO or El Niño.]
So some climate models say that daily precipitation intensity will increase and others say it will decrease. In other words, the climate science community is clueless about what the future might bring for west coast precipitation.
Some might say that climatologists for the State of California and other west coast states have been hampered by climate science. It’s tough to make recommendations to state and local governments for long-term planning when the climate science community provides them with nothing to work with.
Is California prepared for a drought that lasts multiple decades or even centuries?
Anthony Watts’s post included a graph from a paleoclimatological study of West Coast drought that showed past droughts have lasted for hundreds of years. For the original graph and discussion, see Figure 10 of Cook et al. (2007) North American drought: Reconstructions, causes, and consequences. (Note: That’s not the John Cook from SkepticalScience.)
Now I hate to make you think about bad news. But if it’s happened in the past, can it happen again?
Why are mainstream media simply parroting press releases?
Climate-change news reports have become echo chambers of the press releases put out by colleges, universities and government research agencies. Individual reporters might provide a more in-depth report by asking the scientist-authors for a few extra word of wisdom.
But why aren’t the media asking the tough questions, like:
- Why weren’t west-coast residents warned 10 or 15 years ago that a severe drought is just a weather anomaly away?
- Why aren’t there enough desalinization plants in place to supplement rainfall deficits?
- Why are the people of the west coast protesting for, and why are state governments funding, more wind farms and solar arrays when they need something more basic to maintain life there, water?
Seems to me we may very soon be seeing a reversal of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, with vast flocks of California residents migrating back to the Midwest, which also is subject to periodic droughts.
Poor planning on the parts of a few—based on politically motivated, unsound science—may make for emergencies for millions.
The only thing manmade about this climate is the manufactured hype and rewrites of historical records. This is one of the hidden costs of AGW that is now plain to see. Another hidden cost is the oportunity cost of spending so much time and money on AGW instead of dealing with real needs like water.
Both of these costs are driven by the climate obsessed and those who have made their careers off of climate issues. The reality is that the climate obsessed have contributed nothing to help people deal with climate.
Is it just me or are ‘science papers’ sounding more and more like sensational news bites?
Its not just you. But its not so much the papers themselves. Its the sponsoring organization PR about them, apparently all the MSM uses anymore. My guest posts here Shell Games and Tipping Points both contain vivid examples, and where the misleading PR comes from ‘trusted’ NASA and NOAA rather than some Uni PR department. The new book has several other big contemporary examples of the same ilk.
The trend is sometimes called ‘science by press release’, a phase coined (so far as I have been able to reasearch it) concerning the MMR/autism scandal in the UK (proven scientific misconduct and actual fraud). The full story is laid out as an example in The Arts of Truth.
Funny, I’d posited the whole reverse “Grapes of Wrath” idea a while back. But I saw it being driven not just by drought but by the stifling Nanny State that forced people into re-education camps for thought crimes. Any way, it’d make a Helluva parody novel even a movie.
Write a script.
‘Sanity games’
In a nutshell: thanks Bob
Well they are clueless about much more than just west coast precipitation, but you have to admit they are pretty good at press releases.
I’m not one who generally invests much in most “conspiracy theories” per se, however, the complete lock-step mindset and rigidly enforced orthodoxy of the so-called “mainstream” media in the USA is one area where I find it hard to come to any conclusion other than that. If you just watch Big Media (both left and right) in the USA with an open and WELL INFORMED mind, I don’t see how you could come to any other conclusion. Whether you call the cabal calling the shots the wealthy “Ruling Class” elites or something more out in the ozone like the Annunaki/illuminati/blah blah blah cabal, there is a very small cabal calling the shots,
The bottom line is, I do believe there is a very small, powerful cabal who own and control the majority of Big Media and the Infotainment machine and it is THEY who are really steering this society.rapidly into the toilet, and for their own extremely selfish and purely PERSONAL purposes.
Well they do have to keep their advertisers happy. No ratings = no advertisers = no profit. I think they do fall more toward the happily stupid end of the spectrum than evil end
Tisdale is so cute. The way he still expects the media to fact check anything anymore is simply adorable!
Thank you, Chuckarama. I’m happy to receive a compliment even as sarcasm.
Bob, a sincere compliment. We should all expect MSM to do a bit of due diligence. They don’t.
You have gone far beyond, and on complex scientific subjects like ENSO and PDO. Many shoutouts forthcoming. Soldier on in your chosen area of deep expertise. Regards.
The people of California got exactly what they wanted. No new dams, agricultural water diverted to streams to protect endangered species, and government control of everything. How convenient for them that they have been presented with a cause, climate change, that they can blame on everyone else, rather than face the truth that it was their own lack of planning that brought on the water shortage. To make it really convenient, climate change could also be blamed for floods as well as droughts, cold as well as hot. Why plan at all with such a convenient scapegoat?
I think it is time to demand climate scientists to explain why they did not warn of each and every weather event they claim is due to global warming. What is it that the tax payers money is being spent on. It is they that need to be blamed when people suffer from global warming.
Well you can demand all you want, but when it comes to those types of demands climate scientists will readily claim that local weather has nothing to do climate. Of course when they are trying to convince a sketical public they will readily claim local weather is a direct result of climate change.
So they speak from both sides of their mouth at the same time, luckily for the climate they still produce flatulance singularly.
Good point.
…vast flocks of California residents migrating to the Midwest…? Please don’t californicate the Midwest like you did the Northwest!
I am absolutely prepared for climate change, I replaced the friction wheel and thottle cable on my snow-blower.
The reason there are holes in the climate change argument is the science is not there. The reason those pushing the reduce CO2 agenda has nothing to do with climate change and that is why they ignore the flaws. The real agenda is to return the world to a preindustrial state which they somehow believe is better for everyone and will end unequal distribution of wealth by destroying and confiscating wealth.
Are Californians mad enough to change their voting pattern? Not likely. I doubt too there are even enough people left in California with the skills, education, and desire to populate an alternative political party to reverse the trend. Have another sand sandwich.
Goddard draws a neat graphical comparison:
http://stevengoddard.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/screenhunter_3080-sep-26-07-26.jpg?w=640
On this map they have the Phoenix area (and north) in extreme drought. I know for a fact that the last month and a half they have had more than a years worth of rainfall over the whole area depicted on the map.
I live in a desert in Washington State right where that red patch meets the Canadian border. Our lake is full, our rivers are full, and it is raining right now. The cause is obviously our having recently legalized pot. I see Colorado is even more green.
jeez, folks. You expect the US government to be current on its current graphics?
Get with OBummers climate change program, before you get an IRS audit.
That water you think you have? It is fish sustaining water, or beaver dam water. Either way the EPA will outlaw your ever touching it, and you will still be in drought after all…
Provision for drought is a “no brainer” as far as I’m concerned. The North West of the state of Victoria ( where I live) had an old open channel system for delivering stock and domestic water. This system lost vast amounts of water through seepage and evaporation and often the reservoirs ran dry. An underground reticulated system was put on place six years ago and now in the middle of another periodic drought we have water to keep our homes and industries functioning. The system cost a great deal short term but will give us water security on a generational timeframe. Got a problem? Call an engineer.
Got a problem? Call an engineer.
And listen to what (s)he has to say…
We in Australia came out of a 10 year drought about 3 years ago now. Water capacities were below 50% and all looked dire. The alarmists were making predictions such as even if we had rain the soil would not absorb it and the dams etc would never fill again. Of course when the rains came and guess what the dams filled the strategy became that this was also a result of climate change and the media let them get away with it. It just befuddles me that these experts are so far from predicting just about anything that they still have any credibility. Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology has now been exposed as altering historic records to change cooling trends to warming trends and even that is finding traction hard. These guys are not scientists. They have a predictive power dangerously close to zero.
These are just averages. If you are a couple inches below average you are in trouble – and have to plan for that…
http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/pcpn/ca.gif
Here in the Bay Area we range from forest to desert. The 10 inch rainfall line cuts through our Easternmost suburbs, which are located just to the East of Altamont Pass (Tracy, Patterson, Mountain House, etc).
OK, this is my last “comment” for the day:
drought? according to the diagram above California is mostly desert to begin with. has california now invented negative rain?
so why wasn’t California prepared for climate change? They sure spend a lot of time and money on stuff like CARB and carbon trading.
Why doesn’t California have the worlds biggest desalination plant? With all that solar energy available, why not distill sea water? Surely you can find anything greener than that. No need for batteries. No need to worry about what happens at night.
Strange that California can spend billions on a high speed rail system, but can’t figure out that when you live in a desert and population keeps on increasing, you better have a way to get water.
Australia has a bunch of mothballed desalinisation plants they could probably sell you. It wouldn’t be easy to transport them though. I’ve always wondered why they don’t just build these things into giant barges so that they can tow them from drought to drought. They need to be on the sea to operate anyway.
Having lived in California for 25 years, I remember several drought cycles. The first one ended the rainy season after we moved in to our house. The last drought caused some municipalities to consider and install desalination plants. According to a recent Mercury News article, there is only one operating de-sal plant in California (mainland) and 2 operating de-sal plants on the islands off of Los Angeles. There is also a de-sal plant in Santa Barbara, however it was not properly maintained and is not operating today when Santa Barbara needs more water.
As soon as the last drought ended, so did the talk of desalination. Now there are many more de-sal plants proposed, but these will more likely be forgotten if we have more normal rainfall this next rainy season. Sadly, as a result of the last drought, municipalities in San Luis Obispo County spent tax money to connect to the California State Water Project. Prior to this, San Luis Obispo had relied on reservoirs. Thankfully the reservoirs are still maintained, since the State Water Project brings water from Sierra snow melt to cities in the southern parts of California. The problem is that with drier then normal winters, there is less Sierra snow to melt and thus inadequate water in the State Water Project. Many Central Valley farms have been cut off of State Water so that there is adequate State Water for Los Angeles.
Aside from passing water restrictions, neither Governor Brown nor the California Legislature has done anything to prepare California for real drought conditions. They are busy doing other things like instituting a statewide ban on plastic bags, increasing the gasoline tax further (already the highest in the nation), setting up a cap and trade system, and creating an even more onerous regulatory environment. All of this will result in fewer jobs and less water.
Brooks, you nailed it. My college roommate was Navy assigned to the San Fransisco area during the mid 1970’s. I have vivid recollections of he and his wife Linda’s reported water saving struggles with their first children in diapers.
Aside from passing water restrictions, neither Governor Brown nor the California Legislature has done anything to prepare California for real drought conditions.
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reminds me of our own government. we are a sea-port, yet they removed the coast guard station. now the police provide this function.
recently one of the yachts capsized in a local race, and 2 police boats came out to attend. neither had equipment onboard to provide assistance to the yacht, but they were prepared to write tickets for any equipment missing on the yacht.
in the end our race committee chase boat rescued the yacht. neither of the police boats lent a hand, but they did follow and observe very closely, looking for the slightest infraction. saving lives, one ticket at a time.
It isn’t like water shortages are anything new in California.
California Water Wars
The California Water Wars were a series of conflicts between the city of Los Angeles and farmers and ranchers in the Owens Valley of Eastern California. As Los Angeles grew in the late 1800s, it started to outgrow its water supply.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Water_Wars
This diagram shows that flows in the Colorado river have been decreasing in a near straight line since long before Climate Change could possibly have started.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_River#mediaviewer/File:Coloradoflowgraph.gif
Bob
“So some climate models say that daily precipitation intensity will increase and others say it will decrease. In other words, the climate science community is clueless about what the future might bring for west coast precipitation.”
what they wrote.
“Of the 25 downscaled model projections examined here, 21 agree that precipitation frequency will DECREASE by the 2060s, with a mean reduction of 6–14 days yr−1. This reduces California’s mean annual precipitation by about 5.7%. Partly offsetting this, 16 of the 25 projections agree that daily precipitation intensity will INCREASE, which accounts for a model average 5.3% increase in annual precipitation. Between these conflicting tendencies, 12 projections show drier annual conditions by the 2060s and 13 show wetter.”
21 of 25 said precipitation FREQUENCY will decrease. That is days when it rains goes down by 6-14 days
16 of 25 agreed that INTENSITY will increase, that means WHEN it rains it rains more.
when you combine those two metrics and just look at annual totals you have 12 showing drier and 13 showing wetter.
Its important when summarizing to do so accurately.. because it actually makes your case stronger.
when you combine those two metrics and just look at annual totals you have 12 showing drier and 13 showing wetter.
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about what a toss of the coin would predict. only at much reduced cost.
Thanks, Bob. Lets hope to learn from failure, as it should be.
And yes, desalination is a good source of water for colonizing an arid zone.
Is there now no chance of an El Niño 2014?
Add to your list “The law of thermodynamics as it relates to an open gravitational system.” While we haven’t been cooling at ground level for sixteen years, NASA hasn’t needed to do major adjustments to the space station in several years because it is no longer plowing through a greatly expanded atmosphere.
Has anybody actually kept any records as to how much mass a liter of air at sea level has had over the last 30 years? Gravity defines pressure – so much so that we use pressure as a primary means of forecasting. So much so that as you go up in altitude the pressure and temperature drop, as you go down in altitude below sea level the maximum temperature increases along with the maximum air pressure.
The pressure won’t go past a certain point, that means the air temperature won’t go above a certain point either. Law of thermodynamics at work in an open system defined by gravity.
TPV isn’t in ANY of the climate models in any way.
Poor planning spawned emergency but with such a perfect excuse: “climate change”, so no one resigns, their salaries and pensions safe.