Why did Georgia flood so badly this year?

This guy talks about a couple of reasons quite clearly, if a little over-excitedly. He makes good points. There are probably hmore reasons, but these are the jist.



(About his first argument: Fall flooding like this was pretty much predicted by models.)

Obama on Mount Rushmore

As I post, the Park Service is cutting down the banner. But for awhile this morning, Greenpeace managed to hang a banner on the face of Mount Rushmore (without disfiguring the monument at all) to make a visible statement about climate change.

Whatever you think about them or their methods, and whatever I do (hint: for the most part, I approve), I like that they didn't damage the monument at all, and that they were so live and visible about it at the time.

From Ustream:


(Note: That really is supposed to be Obama's face on the banner, and it was even visible as such now and then behind ustream's less-than-clear streaming quality at the time. There's only so much live datastreaming from a remote location can pull off.)

....and now an update: Treehugger has added video. Please go check out their post, too.

But wait: I have a strategy

From XKCD, of course:

Saving power by saving water -- win/win for California

LA Aqueduct Cascades
Originally uploaded by Aquafornia.

There's a double whammy of fortune for folks who want to save electricity and water in California -- Peter Gleck, of the Pacific Institute, a global water research center, says that here in California, we can save electricity by conserving water.

We spend so much electricity shipping it around the state and drawing it up from the ground that using less will save power.

From WorldChanging at The Guardian:

The virtues of water efficiency can be found in California and China - regions where water shortages have become emergencies and droughts may worsen with climate change. Conditions may become more severe in the future as consumers turn to water solutions that often require even greater energy supplies.

In California, where drought is afflicting the land for the third year in a row, the state is reducing water deliveries by 20-30 percent this winter and warns of "the most significant water crisis in its history." The water shortages are forcing farmers to cut production and lay off employees in an already sour economy.

Meanwhile, water transportation, storage, and treatment account for about 19 percent of the state's electricity, according to a 2007 California Energy Commission report [PDF]. To reach the rapidly expanding urban clusters in southern California, for instance, water is pumped 2,000 feet (610 meters) over the Tehachapi Mountains north of Los Angeles.

Mind you, hydroelectric dams create electricity -- but that won't be reduced as we use less. And as the Sierra snowpack melts away with climate change, we will likely lose most of that reservoir, the snow itself, and have to find more ways to store water in our (ostensibly) wet winters to have enough to last us through our dry, dry summers. We'll either have to build a lot more dams, or find other ways to get (and save) water, and to generate power.

California's population is burgeoning, as well. We will, as a whole, want more water, not less, in future years -- and more power. By cutting back now -- growing dry-climate and native gardens, using landscaping water to grow our own climate-adapted food rather than lawns and privet hedges, moving California's crops into areas better suited for them, controlling water use in new developments, and other water conservation measures -- we can use less of the inevitable additional water, rather than more.

(Photo from Aquifornia)

An Island Called California

Yellow-billed Magpie
Originally uploaded by amkhosla.

"It is known that to the right of the Indies there exists an island called California very near the terrestrial paradise; and peopled by black women among whom there was not a single man since they lived in the way of the Amazons.

They had beautiful robust bodies, spirited courage and great strength. Their island was the most impregnable in the world with its cliffs and headlands and rocky coasts. Their weapons were all of gold . . . because in all the island there was no metal except gold.

And there ruled over that island of California a queen of majestic proportions, more beautiful than all others, and in the very vigor of her womanhood. She was not petite, nor blond, nor golden-haired. She was large, and black as the ace of clubs. But the prejudice of color did not then exist even among the most brazen-faced or the most copper-headed. For, as you shall learn, she was reputed the most beautiful of women; and it was she, O Californias! who accomplished great deeds, she was valiant and courageous and ardent with a brave heart, and had ambitions to execute nobler actions than had been performed by any other ruler — Queen Califia." -- from
Las sergas de Esplandián by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo



Yesterday, StrangeMaps showed us a 15th Century map from China that shows what could even be Australia and New Zealand, as well as the classic Island of California off the west coast of North America. This map was created long before Columbus, Magellan, or Drake sailed the seas. Look how similar the continental boundaries are to today's maps, how well the coasts match what we now know.




Though California isn't an island (it's probable that the opening to the Gulf of California and perhaps the Columbia River made it seem so), Elna Bakker used the idea for her book, Island Called California, about California's unique "island ecology." Because we have an ocean to our west, a high mountain ranges to the north and east (with those on the east backed by desert), and desert to the south and southwest, much of California's land is ecologically like an island, with endemic organisms of all sorts. Our magpies have yellow bills, our sequoias are unique, we have lilies and salamanders like no others. To be honest, as much as part of me supports the division of California into two states, a bigger part of me wants not to break that poetic island, to distribute yellow-billed magpies between two states, or to either divide or simply give up the sequoias as "my own."



As California changes with the climate, some of the animals -- amphibians and more delicate herbaceous plants, especially -- will have no place to go. The same barriers that allowed them to develop in unique ways will largely prevent them from adapting by gradually shifting their ranges elsewhere. Around the world, humans have made barriers of their own, as well. Plants and animals can't adapt by moving through farm belts, urban areas, or across new desertified regions, either. We are banishing our wildlife to islands to make do with what they have.