RSS Feed
Archive for July 3rd, 2012
Colorado Wildfires Threaten Water Supplies
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 3rd, 2012
National Geographic: Last week, aerial views of Rampart Reservoir, a critical water-storage facility for Colorado Springs, Colorado, showed spot fires billowing tentacles of smoke over the lake's forested shores.
"It smelled like a big smelly cigar," said Andy Funchess, a water systems field operations manager for the Colorado Springs water utility. Funchess spends his workdays monitoring and maintaining the city's 25 reservoirs and hundreds of miles of pipeline and canals.
As strong winds helped the Waldo Canyon...
Posted in 
Climate change no longer tops US environment worries
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 3rd, 2012
Agence France-Presse: Cooling towers at the Scholven coal-fired power plant in Gelsenkirchen, western Germany. Americans no longer see climate change as the world's number-one environmental issue, according to a public opinion poll released Tuesday amid an ongoing heat wave in much of the United States. Americans no longer see climate change as the world's number-one environmental issue, according to a public opinion poll released Tuesday amid an ongoing heat wave in much of the United States. Twenty-nine percent cited...
This US summer is ‘what global warming looks like’
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 3rd, 2012
Associated Press: Is it just freakish weather or something more? Climate scientists suggest that if you want a glimpse of some of the worst of global warming, take a look at U.S. weather in recent weeks. Horrendous wildfires. Oppressive heat waves. Devastating droughts. Flooding from giant deluges. And a powerful freak wind storm called a derecho. These are the kinds of extremes experts have predicted will come with climate change, although it's far too early to say that is the cause. Nor will they say global warming...
Spain burns as global temperatures rise
Posted by Independent: Katherine Rowland on July 3rd, 2012
Independent: The Spanish city of Valencia sits under a blanket of ash, as two converging fires continue to devour the eastern coast of the country. Since the blaze ignited last week, more than 45,000 hectares of land have been destroyed, forcing upwards of 2,000 people to flee their homes.
The fires, which have not yet been controlled, are the worst the country has seen in more than a decade, and began as scorching temperatures made tinder of the earth. According to the Spanish environmental ministry one of...
Wildfire, heat wave: Is it climate change?
Posted by Orange County Register: Pat Brennan on July 3rd, 2012
Orange County Register: As wildfires devour acreage across the West and a heat wave broils in the East, the question seems natural: Are we feeling the effects of global warming?
Scientists still answer cautiously. No single weather event, they say, can be linked directly to global climate change. But some researchers have begun to draw a broader connection between sweltering temperatures, tinder-dry forests and a warming planet.
While direct links are still elusive, the statistics, they say, reveal climate change...
Heat wave expands again before retreating to the west
Posted by Climate Central: Andrew Freedman on July 3rd, 2012
Climate Central: The grueling, protracted heat wave is still affecting much of the Upper Midwest and Plains on Tuesday, while utility crews have make progress restoring power to the Mid-Atlantic region after unusually severe thunderstorms tore across the region on June 29 in an event forecasters call a "derecho."
According to a Weather Channel analysis of climate data provided by the National Climatic Data Center, the 190 reports of all-time warm temperature records during the June 25 to July 1 period was enough...
Drought caused big drop in Texas portion of Ogallala
Posted by Texas Tribune: Kate Galbraith on July 3rd, 2012
Texas Tribune: The historic Texas drought caused the Ogallala Aquifer to experience its largest decline in 25 years across a large swath of the Texas Panhandle, new numbers from a water district show.
The 16-county High Plains Underground Water Conservation District reported this week that its monitoring wells showed an average decline last year of 2.56 feet -- the third-largest in the district's 61-year history, and three times the average rate over the past decade. Farmers pumped more water during the drought...