Folsom Lake reservoir photographs highlight California's record-breaking drought. Folsom Lake reservoir is currently standing at only 18 percent capacity Grass left covering marina base while dry rocks tumble onto cracked mud Pontoon used to house more than 700 boats but is currently deserted By Lydia Willgress for MailOnline Published: 11:48 GMT, 19 September 2015 | Updated: 16:46 GMT, 19 September 2015 A wooden pontoon has been left surrounded by cracked mud as California's record-breaking drought continues. Shocking images show Folsom Lake reservoir, near Sacramento, standing at only 18 percent capacity. Green grass covers what used to be the marina base while dry rocks can be seen on the former reservoir banks. Scroll down for video A wooden pontoon has been left surrounded by cracked mud as California's record-breaking drought continues Folsom Lake reservoir, near Sacramento, is pictured before the four-year drought left it with no water The pictures emerged as some farmers and water agencies were told they could resume pumping from three waterways.
Loaded: 0% Gov. 'Megadroughts’ predicted to ravage the Southwest - SFGate. Photo: Leah Millis / The Chronicle gallery_thumbnails_show|article-gallery-6078504|article-gallery-6078504|0 gallery_overlay_open|article-gallery-6078504|article-gallery-6078504|0 gallery_overlay_open_thumbs|article-gallery-6078504|article-gallery-6078504|0 Houseboats sit idle in the low water of Lake Oroville with Bidwell Bar Bridge in the back ground near the end of last year when Calif ornia's second-larg est reservoir was close to the 1977 historic low at 26 percent of capacity. Houseboats sit idle in the low water of Lake Oroville with Bidwell... A "for sale" sign is partially visible in exposed earth that used to be submerged as part of Lake Oroville with house boats sitting idle in the background Nov. 29, 2014 in Oroville, Calif.
A "for sale" sign is partially visible in exposed earth that used... Joe Cha, 33, fishes at the new water line at Lake Oroville Nov. 29, 2014 in Oroville, Calif. Joe Cha, 33, fishes at the new water line at Lake Oroville Nov. 29,... Back to Gallery. California Drought Crisis 2014: Massive Groundwater Loss In US West Is Causing Earth's Crust To Lift Like An 'Uncoiled Spring'
The drought-stricken U.S. West is guzzling so much groundwater that the Earth’s crust is starting to “rise up like an uncoiled spring," California scientists said on Thursday. In some places, the Earth has lifted by more than half an inch. Using data points from hundreds of GPS stations, researchers found that nearly 62 trillion gallons of groundwater has disappeared in the past few years, according to the Scripps Institute of Oceanography at the University of California at San Diego.
That’s about how much ice is lost from the Greenland ice cap each year because of global warming, the Los Angeles Times noted. The Scripps team found that the water shortage is causing an “uplift” effect on the tectonic plate that supports the western region. Most of the 11-state region has experienced varying degrees of drought over the past year, with unusually hot temperatures and low rainfalls this summer exacerbating conditions.
An August 19 drought map of the 11-state U.S. Global Warming Isn't Causing California Drought? Report Triggers Storm. Natural conditions, not human-caused emissions of greenhouse gases, are the driving force behind California's three-year dry spell, scientists on a federal task force concluded Monday. But the report came under fire from some experts who said it downplayed other factors that have humanity's fingerprints on them. The evidence suggests a naturally induced "warm patch" of water in the western Pacific helped to create a high-pressure ridge that blocked precipitation from entering California, the experts said at a news conference to release the report. "We have been able to identify this as a mode of ocean forcing of atmospheric circulation that causes West Coast drought," said Richard Seager, a climate model specialist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.
"The report is not dismissive of global warming at all," said Marty Hoerling, a meteorologist at NOAA's Earth System Research Lab. "At the same time, drought is not a consequence of the warming planet to date. " Sécheresse en Californie. No Relief Forecast After One Of California's Driest Years Ever. Hide captionDowntown Los Angeles peeps through the distance and dry brush.
Many cities in California closed out 2013 as the driest year since record-keeping began more than a century ago. Nick Ut/AP Downtown Los Angeles peeps through the distance and dry brush. Many cities in California closed out 2013 as the driest year since record-keeping began more than a century ago. It's a near-perfect morning on Venice Beach in Southern California, temperatures in the 60s, with a breeze. Scott and Sue Nolan, visiting from Houston, play kickball in the sand with their son.
"One of the thoughts, when we were driving through town was, how are they sustaining all this with what you see so dry everywhere? " The Nolans are seeing the effects of California's lingering drought. For the third year in a row, rain and snowfall in the state have been extremely low. The U.S. Haynes says the lack of snow in Northern California affects the entire state. Gov. California Sleepwalks into Water Crisis. When California’s Governor Jerry Brown ordered mandatory reductions in water use last week, it came as no surprise in a state that’s experienced an extended and unprecedented drought.
Now in its fourth year, the drought has fueled groundwater pumping by farmers, lowering water tables, driving land subsidence, and damaging roads, bridges and other infrastructure. Snow-capped mountain ranges no longer have snow. Citizens in some smaller communities worry they’ll loss access to water altogether. And banks and corporations are beginning to ask if they’re now exposed to potential risks and losses. Against this backdrop, the governor’s 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and last week’s water-use cuts appear to many water experts to be too little too late. So what can California do to shore up its dwindling water supply? A Complex Water System As WRI noted last year, about two-thirds of California’s irrigated agriculture faces extremely high levels of water stress.
Climate change, El Niño, cold winters, and California’s drought. It was a winter Charles Dickens would write an opening line about. Parts of the Midwest and Eastern US experienced periods of bitterly cold weather delivered from the Arctic by the jet stream. The West Coast, meanwhile, received very little precipitation—producing a historic drought in California that looms large over the coming summer—as a result of the jet stream zagging in the opposite direction. The detours of the jet stream were large, and they were persistent. The northward-bending “ridge” shielded the West Coast from moisture-bearing weather that would normally water the Californian landscape and restock the supply of mountain snow that provides meltwater over the dry summer. Many wondered if climate change could be partly responsible—a question that gets asked about every extreme now.
Searching for correlations Two of the usual suspects for weather variability on the West Coast are the El Niño Southern Oscillation and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Finding larger trends. California's Thirst Triggers Earthquakes, Lifts Mountains. One of California's worst environmental disasters can move mountains and cause earthquakes. The Sierra Nevada and other mountain ranges ringing fertile farmlands in California's Central Valley are springing upward atop land freed of an immense weight — enough water to fill Lake Tahoe. Thirsty Californians have sucked so much water from beneath the Central Valley that scientists estimate the Sierra Nevada mountains and Coast Ranges both rose nearly 6 inches (15 centimeters) since groundwater pumping started in 1860.
The Central Valley grows 25 percent of the nation's food, but most of its water comes from wells, not rainfall. California's boom-and-bust water cycle not only flexes the Earth, it also triggers earthquakes along the San Andreas Fault, according to the same study, published today (May 14) in the journal Nature. [5 Ways We Waste Water] Heaving Earth As the Earth warps, the movement clamps and unclamps the nearby San Andreas Fault, triggering earthquakes, the researchers think. California Drought.