Sobering article on SFGate.com re water crisis

[ailsagirl]

Water managers told: Plan now for crisis
David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor

Friday, February 1, 2008

California and Bay Area cities must start planning now for new and costly systems to control increasing runoff from urban storms, springtime floods from swollen rivers and rising sea levels as they invade lowlands, all as a result of global warming, climate scientists and water experts warn.

Climate change, they say, will result in thinner winter snowpacks in the Sierra and other Western mountains. As snowpacks melt earlier each spring, the meltwater will increase river flows and raise new threats of floods. Even a small rise in sea levels could threaten cities and farmland in low-lying areas, like the Delta and Silicon Valley.

New urban systems to handle winter storm runoff, new designs for dams and flood control structures, and higher dikes and levees around lands that even now lie below sea level will be needed, the scientists argue.

"The challenge is daunting," said Paul C. Milly of the U.S. Geological Survey, who led an international research team reporting in the journal Science on Saturday. "Patterns of change are complex, uncertainties are large; and the knowledge base changes rapidly."

More at
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/02/01/MNC9UOA3M.DTL&type=science

[mulsh]

1. Water, historically about the most important aspect of

California's development. thanks for posting this.