NYT: Latest Climate Report Warns of Major Upheaval to California Way of Life

Oct 19 - The dire projections come from the state’s Fifth Climate Change Assessment, which analyzes the impacts of changing weather patterns on the nation’s most-populous state. In just a few decades, summers in California will not only be much hotter, but will also stretch for months longer. Floods will become more widespread and extreme. Exposure to wildfire smoke will kill thousands more people every year. According to the report, average temperatures are likely to increase in California by about 4 degrees Fahrenheit by the middle of the century, and could rise 5 to 8 degrees by 2100. Warm weather will arrive in California earlier in the year and persist later, with summer conditions lasting for 135 days on average by the middle of the century, compared with an average of 90 days between 1981 and 2010. That prolonged summer will have widespread impacts, including on fire risk, tourism, agriculture and wildlife, (as well as) a 40 percent reduction by midcentury in California’s snowpack in the Sierra Nevada, which feeds the state’s reservoirs. Unlocked article HERE.