That's happening in a few places, I thought. Abnormally dry this summer.

I think that's happening near where my parents live as well, only they still have water for now, but if it keeps up they won't have any water in a few months.

The town where my dad grew up hasn't got any water right now either. They had some nasty flooding that destroyed the damn to the resevoir where they got all their water.

Yep, global warming sure is just a lie them dang leeb'rals have been usin' to give Al Gore a nobel peace prize.

Northern Georgia is going to be out of water fairly soon, as well, if it doesn't get a lot more rain.

Makes me thirsty.

It's got nothing to do with global warming, and everything to do with very bad use of aquifers that replenish more slowly than we use them up.

The further west you go in the US, the more likely that water use legislation is going to be of a "finders keepers" variety, which was developed as the country expended. In other words, the first in time to a given water source, generally speaking, has rights that trump all later users, and they can do with it what they want.

The north eastern US follows rules more akin to old British Common Law.

But, most of the mid-western, western aquifers could be preserved much more effectively through good water management- farmers in the US frequently use incredibly wasteful methods of irrigation that consume far more water than they actually need. In fact, even in water-rich areas, poorly managed agricultural concerns deplete groundwater (I'm talking places like Michigan and Minnesota- you know, places that contain 20% of the world's fresh water- and you still have towns that run out of water because of very poor ground water management). I mean, cripes, some states subsidize farmers who are irrigating what would otherwise be desert.


But as for global warming? I'm not saying it isn't something to think about, but, don't be these people:

In happier news, Nebraska's six and a half year long drought broke.

Suckers.

I am under the impression this is a sudden drought. Please demonstrate that it isn't, and rather that water resources in that state have been steadily declining over the years, which would prove that poor water management is to blame.

Poor water management probably has something to do with why that city is out of water; but the drought is caused by atypical climate, which is at least very worrying.

The rains are laggy 'cause IRE took their server. Notice how quick IRE MUDs are now?

Bad water management would certainly make the water supply more sensitive to exogenous shocks. Knowing very little about the water setup in the US, I can't really speculate on whether or not climate change is that shock, but you shouldn't dismiss water management as a contributing factor just because it's not the only contributing factor.

Sudden droughts happen. I remember here there were two or three summers in a row when the whole country was out of water, and everyone was doing a similar "OMG GLOBALWARMING!!!!1111one", but they haven't come back since.

We've been seeing local weather disturbances almost constantly in recent years. It does seem somewhat apparent that climate has ceased to be as reliable as we had come to expect.

They have an aquifer. No sudden drought should cause that sort of shortage. Like I posted above, we broke a six and a half year drought here without depleting our water supply. We lost an major river. It's still only a few inches deep. Groundwater and the larger (and much dirtier, so largely unused) Missouri river kept the pipes full. No Nebraska town lost municipal or well water.

Correction.

You have heard more stories about local weather disturbances almost constantly in recent years. (which I doubt that to be true, but that is your perception.)

The reason for hearing that could be global warming, or it could be your new found awareness of global warming.

We had some cold weather a few months back (which we get every 5 or so years). Everyone said it was global warming.


California has had some major droughts latley, mostly do to the fact that the government decided that a specieis of Algae in one of the resovours was enangered, and we couldn't use that lake anymore. And then there was a power shortage, and they couldn't clean enough water. And then they decided to remodel the Yorba Linda water treatment plant... All within the same six months.

Droughts happen periodically, very frequently from an ecological standpoint. Climates also aren't inherently a permanent thing- the Sahara desert, for example, has been steadily expanding long before the first factories infuriated captain planet. Any time there is a negative change in climate, even temporarily, people cannot throw their hands up in the air, cry "global warming! When will people learn to care about their environment! Quickly, lets throw more regulations on automotive emissions which will, at best, produce an extremely small marginal, and expensive decrease in emissions when, by far, more damage is done by cattle than all the cars in the world taken together!"

Honestly, anyone who's really concerned about what we're putting in the air on a personal level is, on some level, a hypocrite if they're not a vegetarian. (I am!) It's effective, good dinner conversation, and is far less expensive than buying a Prius.

The problem is, people like to put problems in a box, and create a villian. While global warming warrants real monitoring and research, in practice, it ends up being treated like this:

The Pharoh's poor leadership and disrespectul behavior has angered Ra!

becomes

The President's poor environmental policy and catering to big oil has caused global warming to run roughshod over our society!


I'm not saying that you're one of these people at all, but typically I find that many of the self-titled environmentalist groups operate more on a "principle of the thing" level, as opposed to an actual scientific problem solving level.

...but yeah, I was an econ undergrad with significant courseload in environmental economics, then took classes like water law and environmental law when getting my JD. My father does neutral enviromental and emissions testing. So, while I might sound like a Fox News affilliate here, mostly this is coming out of my own annoyance of having to basically wade through piles of psuedo-science and bad research any time I have to address an issue just because it's such a hot-button political thing that both sides hemmorage out a forest's trees worth of paper in pure :censor: alone.

While almost everything Rainydays says there is correct, I'd advise caution on two fronts: first, accusing people of being hypocrites because they claim to care the same amount about a problem but don't match up to your standard of preventing it. What one person feels is an acceptable sacrifice might depend on how much they value what they need to give up, not how much they value the thing they're trying to protect. It doesn't mean that their sacrifice is less than yours. Insert Biblical poor woman/rich man parable here.

Secondly, the optimal amount of air pollution is not zero. Be careful to include that in your thinking.

With that said: right on! Though you'll never convince me to become a vegetarian - meat's too damn tasty

Except, it isn't. According to our friends at the EPA, emissions from transportation alone are tripe the total emissions from agricultural sources in the US.

How exactly does not using a lake effect rainfall? I'm assuming you mean California has had some major water shortages, not droughts.

We don't' get rain in Southern California, I'm not sure what you are talking about.

(small reference to private practice episode)