Climate Change
While there still remain some pockets of dispute, both science and our experience show that the world's climate has been warming significantly over the past half century. Greater quantities of "greenhouse" gasses (carbon dioxide and methane) in the atmosphere appear clearly to be the cause. Increased evaporation from warmth accounts for diminishment of available water supplies.
Posts - Any technical papers, data, opinions, announcements, etc. that relate to this Climate Change issue appear just below.
We welcome postings on this or other water-related issues from interested parties. Please email your posts, preferably in Word format, to the Editorial Board at Info@MRGWaterAdvocates.org
Description of the Issue
Planning, Policy, and Climate Change Adaptation
Climate change will reduce the water supply for the Middle Rio Grande, requiring that we adapt to less water. Focus on this fact is essential.
New Mexico's Annual Average Temperature has Increased 3 Degrees Farenheit since 1970. Source: New Mexico Tech, Earth Matters, Summer 2020 Edition
Dr. David Gutzler, one of New Mexico’s internationally renowned climate change scientists, testified for an hour at the introductory meeting of the House Energy, Environment, and Natural Resources Committee on January 17, 2019. His summary:
My plea is that we need to modernize water policy in New Mexico as best we can and as equitably as we can but in recognition of a changing climate in which surface water supplies are diminished across the state. I think we have no choice but to do that. Please don't ignore what is happening with the supply of water in our state and what is likely to happen in the future.
It’s better to plan than to get thrown under the bus. Sooner is better than later.
Increased temperatures and other climate change impacts have and will continue to reduce snowpack and snowmelt runoff, cause earlier spring runoff, increase evaporation losses and evapotranspiration from crops and the bosque, and lead to more intense storms.
Links
The New Mexico Political Report on July 3, 2020 published A river runs dry: Climate change offers opportunity to rethink water management on the Rio Grande. The article addresses climate change challenges to our water supply and the opportunity we have to take a hard look at what we want and to make changes.
The New Mexico Bureau of Geology's Earth Matters Summer 2020 issue is entitled New Mexico’s Climate in the 21st Century: A Great Change is Underway. A very readable article by Dr. David Gutzler presents the science of climate change-caused reductions to New Mexico's surface water supplies that are already underway. One summary excerpt:
A Time of Change in New Mexico
We have just described potential 21st-century changes that exceed the bounds of climate variability ever experienced by humans in the Southwest. Some of the projected changes are well underway—rising temperature, diminished snowpack, and earlier snowmelt runoff. There is nothing abstract or hypothetical about human-caused climate change in New Mexico. It’s happening now. Other projected changes, such as diminished total flow in our major rivers, are not yet easily detected but are still projected to occur later this century, when long-term changes exceed natural variability.
Advocacy Projects
All three advocacy projects of the MRG Water Advocates are directly related to planning for and adapting to climate change reductions to our surface water supplies.
The Rio Grande New Mexico Basin Study will provide a range of forecasts of our future water supply under climate change. It will also use computer models to simulate the effectiveness of water management alternatives to adapt to a reduced water supply.
The Middle Rio Grande Water Advocates believe it is essential that we begin effective water planning in the Middle Rio Grande to evaluate alternatives and select steps that we must implement if our climate change adaptation is to minimize the disruption that we face.
The Agency/Water Report card will evaluate and call attention to Middle Rio Grande progress and deficiencies.
