Editorial: Adapting to climate’s new normal
Publisher’s note: This editorial is from the May 5, 2013, Sacramento Bee.
No doubt, it is gearing up to be a dry, ugly summer.
It’s just early May, but fires have erupted around the state, most notably in Ventura County. Folsom Reservoir, normally brimming with water at this time of year, is at two-thirds its capacity. And it won’t get help from the remaining snowpack, which, according to the state’s latest and last snow survey, is at 17 percent of normal.
It was possible to walk under the Tahoe Keys pier in November 2009. Photo/LTN file
But of course, that’s the problem. Climate change has changed the norm, creating a “new normal” that is far from easy to predict. All we know is that the bulk of reputable scientists tell us to prepare for extremes. By this, they mean extreme events far beyond what is “normal” in a state known for its disastrous wildfires, droughts, floods and mudslides.
Earlier this year, the U.S. Global Change Research Program released a draft of its Climate Assessment Report. It noted that the Southwestern United States, including California, has heated up markedly in recent decades.
“The period since 1950 has been hotter than any comparable period in at least 600 years,” the report stated, citing more than 10 studies. It also cited research concluding that human-caused temperature increases and drought have killed trees and increased both the frequency and size of wildfires in the region.
Climate models – not absolute proof, but the best tools available for forecasting the future – show that annual average temperatures in the Southwest are projected to rise 2 to 6 degrees Fahrenheit by 2041-70 even if global emissions of greenhouse gases are substantially reduced. The Climate Assessment Report warns that the Southwest should prepare for decreased snowpack and stream flows, meaning reduced water for cities, agriculture and fisheries. It predicts serious impacts on high-value crops, stronger flood events and more extreme high tides. And it warns that, with 90 percent of the Southwest’s population living in urban areas, heat waves will claim an ever-higher toll, partly because of the way hard-scaped cities amplify heat, known as the “heat-island effect.”
California has been a leader in reducing greenhouse gases through cleaner cars, energy efficiency, conservation and a state law requiring a reduction in emissions. But adaptation has to be an equal part of the strategy. Overall, and especially on the local and regional level, public officials aren’t taking seriously the need to prepare their communities for the kind of extreme events that are inevitable with a changing climate.
These extremes – and the responses to them – vary on where Californians live. In the Central Valley, authorities must prepare communities for flooding evacuations and protracted heat waves that are particularly brutal, especially for the elderly and infirm. In coastal areas, sea level rise is projected to increase, and flooding and erosion are already occurring in places where houses were built too close to the water, or too close to cliffs.
In Southern California and the foothills, wildfires are the primary threat, and as the photo above shows, the unrestrained construction of suburban homes in wildfire zones complicates the task of first responders.
California has developed a “climate change adaptation strategy” that is thoughtful and comprehensive, including a tool called “Cal-Adapt” that allows local officials to better understand projected impacts to their communities.
Local leaders need to read this report and take the threats seriously. To adapt to a changing climate, cities and counties will have to be proactive in planning for more extreme floods, droughts and fires, even if means changing their general plans that were developed under the “old normal.”
As a long-time Tahoe local who happens to be doing work on a global-level in the field of sustainability, the tenor of this editorial is correct, but a little misguided & somewhat premature in giving CA so much credit as to its “thoughtful & comprehensive” development of a ‘climate change adaptation strategy’ as the tactics (which are part & parcel of any strategic platform), are still very much short-sighted.
AB 32 , along with SB 375, the so-called Sustainable Community Strategy, both use as its “low-hanging fruit” automobile emissions, probably rationalized by the sheer amount of car traffic in a state with 37 million people. . .
There is way more to consider about sustainability than merely CO2 emissions, as sustainability’s full range will allow for a much better quality of life for each & every individual in other aspects of their life from now on, as more is realized & revealed about making sustainability the necessary normative shift in human behavior that creates yet another “new normal” that is much easier to predict, if not incorporate into one’s own life, allowing for way more than the frightening crisis mode mentality.
That’s why sociologists know them as ‘normative patterns’, and we as a people need more of a transformative one.
If the current New “allows local officials (a way) to better understand projects impacts to their communities”, then it should also include ways to translate how much benefit will accrue to the future through enhancement of other aspects of their lives to make that change both more amenable & attractive, far beyond just worrying about which car has that much better fuel economy.
It would seem, for example, that the petroleum industry keeps finding ways to work with ‘supply & demand’, so even when one buys a car with 90-mpg potential, the price will no doubt be 15.00/gallon. . .and, for the consumer with that 90-mpg car, they then become just smug enough with their choice, that they end up driving as much as they want – they’ve done their part, so what’s the problem ?
But what of nutrition from food that actually has some; packaging that doesn’t keep clogging both landfills & all our ocean currents; pharmaceuticals that stand-in for appropriate medical treatment, yet end up in the food chain of so many other species, more detrimental to all even while only addressing the ‘symptom’ versus the actual source of the problem.
The problem is still there. . .
It then does not become surprising that ‘public officials’ don’t take “seriously the need to prepare their communities for the kind of extreme events”.
If ‘public officials’, indeed, all of us, are to “tak(e) seriously the need to prepare communities for the kind of extreme events that are (now) inevitable”. . . then every citizen needs to be aware that ‘proactive’ planning includes them as well . . . even the entire U.S. EPA has now officially recognized that sustainability has to be embedded in most of what they do, as each & every troubled category is now so daunting that a ‘mere program’ will not suffice. . .
The upper reaches of most Cabinet-level agencies now concern themselves not with the risk assessment directions of the past, but more of a scenario planning approach, which is where the tenor of the Bee’s piece is correct.
Imagine if everyone took a look at ‘scenario planning’ for their family over the next several decades in such an environment – then the “status quo” that they now seem so intent on holding-on-to for dear life, will not seem so daunting to change accordingly.
That in turn takes the pressure off of “public officials”, and indeed our entire society, who can only resort to finding more money, instead of understanding the real problem itself.
As Pogo said, (in 1952, for those that can remember): “We have seen the enemy, and it is US”. . .
Or in a more contemporary vein, Joni Mitchell, who sang, “It all comes down to YOU. . .”
Gary Bowen, Thanks for your effort advocating on our collective behalf. The sound of aerocraft zooming over the heads of the lizardtarians and foxtilians is almost palpable but…. Keep Calm and Carry ON!