More than one third of US counties face water shortages due to climate change

Forkboy

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Wed Jul-21-10 05:57 PM
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More than one third of US counties face water shortages due to climate change

WASHINGTON (July 20, 2010) -- More than 1,100 U.S. counties -- a full one-third of all counties in the lower 48 states -- now face higher risks of water shortages by mid-century as the result of global warming, and more than 400 of these counties will be at extremely high risk for water shortages, based on estimates from a new report by Tetra Tech for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

The report uses publicly available water use data across the United States and climate projections from a set of models used in recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) work to evaluate withdrawals related to renewable water supply. The report finds that 14 states face an extreme or high risk to water sustainability, or are likely to see limitations on water availability as demand exceeds supply by 2050. These areas include parts of Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas. In particular, in the Great Plains and Southwest United States, water sustainability is at extreme risk.

The more than 400 counties identified as being at greatest risk in the report reflects a 14-times increase from previous estimates. For a look at county- and state-specific maps detailing the report findings (including a Google Earth map), go to http://www.nrdc.org/globalWarming/watersustainability/ and http://rd.tetratech.com/climatechange/projects/nrdc_climate.asp.

While detailed modeling of climate change impacts on crop production was beyond the scope of the Tetra Tech analysis, the potential scale of disruption is reflected based on the value of the crops produced in the 1,100 at-risk counties. In 2007, the value of the crops produced in the at-risk counties identified in the report exceeded $105 billion. A separate study compared the Tetra Tech data with county-level crop production data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture; state-specific fact sheets outlining the potential agricultural impacts may be found at http://agcarbonmarkets.com/Science.htm.

http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2010/07/more-than-one-third-of-us-counties-face.html

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HockeyMom

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Wed Jul-21-10 06:03 PM
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1. It's rainy season and it isn't raining in Florida

HOT, dry, and miserable. Solution? Get the hell out of here.

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Motown_Johnny

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Wed Jul-21-10 06:06 PM
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2. what constitutes a shortage?

Edited on Wed Jul-21-10 06:07 PM by Motown_Johnny

I live in southeast Michigan. Of those 3 red counties in my area 2 are bordered by freshwater and the third is right next to one that is. Maybe they need better facilities to make the water drinkable but there is defiantly water there.

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davidinalameda

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Wed Jul-21-10 06:06 PM
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3. it looks like its time

to do some serious work on cleaning up the desalination process

know that the plants suck up a lot of energy

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Name removed

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Wed Jul-21-10 06:09 PM
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