‘A perfect storm for the whole food system right now’: One of the world’s largest fertilizer companies warns that every country—even those in Europe—is facing a food crisis
Tristan Bove – January 26, 2023
The Ukraine war upended the global economy in many ways. Energy markets have been among the most affected, with declining Russian oil and natural gas exports to the West sparking a domino effect of fuel crises worldwide. But the war has also warped another critical facet of the global economy: food.
Prior to the war, Russia and Ukraine were global breadbaskets as top producers and exporters of wheat, sunflower seeds, and barley. The fighting ended up aggravating hunger and food crises in low-income countries that are dependent on imports. But both Russia and Ukraine are also key cogs in the global fertilizer industry, and the war has triggered a shortage of the critical commodity that few people consider but is nevertheless essential to global food security.
Much as Russian President Vladimir Putin leveraged the world’s reliance on his country’s fossil fuels to weaponize energy supplies during the war, he is doing something very similar with fertilizer and food, Svein Tore Holsether, CEO of Norwegian chemical company Yara International, among the world’s largest fertilizer producers and suppliers, told the Financial Times in an interview published Thursday.
Putin’s energy gambit, which sent fossil fuel prices soaring and left Europe on the brink of recession last year, has so far not gone as expected, with a warm winter working against him and Europe able to buy natural gas from elsewhere. But Holsether warned the world’s reliance on Russia for fertilizer threatens more disruption of food supply, adding to existing challenges of logistics bottlenecks and climate change.
“If you look at the role that we have allowed Russia to have in global food supply, we depend on them. How did that happen? What kind of weapon is that? And Putin is weaponizing food,” Holsether said.
“It is sort of a perfect storm for the whole food system right now: very challenging in Europe, of course, with higher prices; even worse in other parts of the world where a human being dies every four seconds as a result of hunger,” he added.
Global fertilizer crisis
When natural gas prices surged last year after Russia invaded Ukraine, so did prices for fertilizer, which manufacturers such as Yara produce with ammonia and nitrogen obtained as a byproduct from natural gas. Fertilizer prices had already begun increasing in 2021 due to high energy costs and supply-chain issues.
Declining natural gas prices and weak demand among farmers have eased pressures somewhat over the past few months. Earlier this month, fertilizer prices fell to their lowest level in nearly two years in tandem with natural gas prices. But despite falling prices, Holsether insists that the global fertilizer market is precarious, and countries should shift from relying on Russian natural gas, to safeguard their agricultural industries.
“Putin has weaponized energy and they’re weaponizing food as well,” Holsether told the BBC at last week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “It’s the saying, ‘Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.’”
Fertilizer prices remain high by historical standards, and the World Bank warned earlier this month that global supply is still tight due to the war, production cuts in Europe, and stricter export controls in China.
Averting a food crisis
If fertilizer is in short supply or prices remain unaffordable to many countries, farmers may be unable to keep their soil fertile enough for crops.
Concerns over fertilizer have taken center stage in recent weeks in Africa, which is heavily reliant on Russian food imports, and where agricultural production has taken a blow in recent years due to drought in many countries. The eastern Horn of Africa—including Somalia, Sudan, and Kenya—has been particularly hard-hit, as it is likely on the verge of a sixth straight failed rainy season, the worst drought conditions in 70 years of recorded data.
Securing additional sources of fertilizer was the cornerstone of a $2.5 billion U.S. food assistance package to Africa signed last month, while Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen noted the importance of stabilizing fertilizer supply in Africa multiple times during a visit to Zambia this week.
“Now we’re in 2023, it’s tragic and shouldn’t be like that,” Holsether told the FT about the state of global hunger. “That should be a very strong reminder of the need to have a more robust food system—from a climate perspective, from a logistics perspective, but also from a political perspective.”
Holsether said that all countries must become more self-sufficient with their food production. For fertilizer, he touted the promise of “green fertilizers” that use hydrogen and renewable energy to produce ammonia rather than natural gas, saying that clean and local solutions are critical to decoupling the global food system from Russia’s war.
Holsether also warned that European nations should not rely on their wealth to avert a food or fertilizer crisis. Like with natural gas, Europe has in recent months turned to the U.S. for nitrogen to replace Russian imports, but Holsether warned that Europe buying its way out of a food crisis is no remedy for global food insecurity.
“Yes. Not near term…there will be a shortage and there will be a global auction for food—but Europe is a wealthy part of the world,” Holsether said when asked if Europe should be concerned for its food security.
“But we need to think it through,” he added, saying that Europe buying food and fertilizer products from other countries will only create more global supply shortages and take away from other countries in dire need.
“In terms of food and food security, when you have that, you see wars or mass migrations, extremism, all these things,” he said.
Scrub Hub: Passing a wind farm, I see some turbines spinning and others motionless. Why?
Karl Schneider, Indianapolis Star – January 23, 2023
Wind farms are becoming more common in Indiana. The state already boasts the fourth largest “farm” in the U.S. and produces nearly 3,500 megawatts of wind energy, with more on the horizon.
The towering windmills reaching up to the sky produce slightly more than 9% of all the electricity used in the state. That’s enough to power more than 1 million homes, according to the American Clean Power Association.
With more projects in the works that will produce another 302 megawatts, and a handful of bills proposed in this session of the General Assembly, wind power is likely to continue to grow across the state. And with the increasing presence of the conspicuous energy generators comes some curiosity.
So, for this edition of Scrub Hub, we took to our trusty submission form and chose a question from Teresa, who asked: Why are the wind turbines not turning right now?
Wind turbines operate in a rural area north of Lafayette, Indiana, on Wednesday, August 4, 2021.
It’s possible for the blades on wind turbines to reach up to speeds of 200 mph, so it may seem odd when some are spinning very quickly while the blades on others nearby are not moving.
We dug around in some state, federal and industry reports and reached out to academic experts in energy technology to determine why some turbines in a wind farm spin while others remain still.
Short Answer: The turbine is down for maintenance
Wind turbines, like all machines, need both scheduled and unscheduled maintenance. In some instances that explains why some are operating but not others.
The basic components of a wind turbine are the visible tower and rotor blades, as well as the gearbox and generator located at the top of the tower.
Scheduled maintenance helps prevent wear and tear from breaking parts and unscheduled maintenance occurs when the turbine experiences any of a number of failures.
Regular preventative maintenance can include periodic equipment inspection, oil and filter changes, calibration and adjustment of various parts, as well as replacing brake pads and seals. General housekeeping and blade cleaning can also temporarily keep a turbine from spinning.
In larger wind farms, several turbines on a circuit can be inoperable and not spinning because they are all down for maintenance, said John Roudebush, program chair of Ivy Tech College’s Energy Technology program.
Long answer: Curtailment, congestion and wind speed
Energy transmission in Indiana is run through the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, commonly known as MISO. The group manages the flow of electricity by balancing demand versus what’s being generated, which means there are times where excess electricity is being produced.
“(Sometimes) we don’t need the power as demand is down or another power plant is selling power to the customers instead,” Roudebush wrote in an email. “Power plants compete on the grid. A coal plant, a natural gas plant, or a wind farm will all bid to sell power during some part of the day and MISO will pick the cheapest bid for the day. Generally, wind is the cheapest but not always.”
John Hall, assistant professor at the University of Buffalo’s Engineering and Applied Sciences, focuses his research on the technical aspects of wind energy. While some wind turbines will operate normally, he said others may be stopped to match production with grid demand.
“Basically, you have the utility company distributing power and buying and selling in real time,” Hall said. “Based on how much they need, wind farms would turn turbines off accordingly.”
The industry calls a wind turbine that is not spinning “parked,” Hall said, and this is done with a braking system that holds the rotor in place. Once energy demand rises, the brake is released and almost immediately the turbine starts delivering electricity to the grid again.
Another obvious answer to why the turbines may not be spinning is that the wind speed is not high enough.
Generally, turbines can generate power with wind speeds as low as 5 mph. If speeds fall below that, there just isn’t enough to turn the sometimes massive blades.
On the other hand, wind that is too fast can cause damages to the turbines, so operators of wind farms will park the rotors until the wind calms down. Turbines generally shut down when wind speeds hit about 55 mph.
“The system is not designed for that, so they shut it down,” Hall said. “That’s OK because we rarely get winds over that speed, and it would not be worthwhile to design for that for the few instances.”
To help improve the efficiency of wind farms, Hall said banking excess power is a huge research area right now.
“There are studies on new battery technology and super capacitors and different ways to get around that issue,” Hall said.
Another solution for storing excess electricity is by making hydrogen, Hall said. Wind farm operators would be able to create hydrogen and store it for use later when the grid demand increases.
While fossil fuel plants may be more responsive to the constantly moving supply and demand for electricity, Hall said the future depends on renewables.
“If folks are concerned about climate and want a better future for the next generation and everything, renewable energy like wind and hydro-electric and tidal power are all really not just sources of energy but vital to perhaps our existence,” Hall said.
Karl Schneider is an IndyStar environment reporter.
IndyStar’s environmental reporting project is made possible through the generous support of the nonprofit Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
Western Kansas farmers are pushing to save the Ogallala Aquifer before it’s too late
David Condos – January 22, 2023
David Condos/Kansas News Service
Travis Leonard had seen all the signs.
Plummeting water levels. Clogged sprayer nozzles. Then as drought parched southwest Kansas this fall, the well next to his farmhouse in Haskell County began pumping up a muck of sand instead of clear water.
After more than six decades of irrigating the family’s grain field, he shut the well down for the last time.
“I just took a deep breath,” Leonard said, “knowing this is the last crop that I’m going to have here that has water on it.”
Leonard remembers when the underground water supply seemed endless. When he took over the farm 16 years ago, it had more than a dozen irrigation wells pumping. Today, it’s down to three.
A decade or two from now, he figures, his area won’t have any irrigation wells left.
“We didn’t have any idea when it was going to end, but that day is coming,” Leonard said. “It will happen to everybody eventually.”
Fly over these dry plains and you won’t see many rushing rivers or glimmering lakes. You’ll see circles. Mile after mile of green geometric crop fields spun into the near-desert landscape by wells that tap water hidden beneath the surface and the center pivot irrigation sprayers splayed around them.
But across western Kansas, more and more wells sit abandoned as underground water levels drop and drop some more. Vast swaths of the region have seen more than half of their water disappear since the dawn of irrigation. Wallace County on the Colorado state line has lost roughly 80%.
The subterranean reservoirs of the sprawling Ogallala Aquifer make life possible here — from powering the multibillion-dollar agricultural economy to filling up cups at the kitchen sink.
But after decades of large-scale crop irrigation, that water is running out. And now farmers and state leaders struggle to agree on how to save the future of life in western Kansas without choking the livelihoods of the people who live here.
The good news? There’s still time. After all, an aquifer that’s half-empty is also half-full.
Even with all the depletion, billions and billions of gallons remain stored away in the Ogallala’s craggy layers of saturated rock. And a new effort in west-central Kansas aims to save more of what’s left.
Katie Durham, who leads that groundwater management district, said it’s not too late to preserve the aquifer — and the western Kansas farms, businesses and communities that depend on it — for future generations.
But only if big changes start now.
“This is do or die,” Durham said. “Water is everything out here. … We would not be here without it.”
Now or never
In a wood-paneled room at the Scott County fairgrounds, dozens of farmers gather for the first public hearing to discuss this latest effort in west-central Kansas. It’s called a local enhanced management area, or LEMA, and it’s been nearly a decade in the making.
The plan is to get farmers to cut irrigation by an average of 10% over the next five years in four western Kansas counties — Wallace, Greeley, Scott and Lane. Those counties have been some of the hardest hit by aquifer declines, losing nearly two-thirds of their water since irrigation began.
And the flow of moisture that’s trickling back down to refill the aquifer is a drop in the bucket. Across the four counties, the amount of water pumped up is nearly 10 times the amount that seeps back underground from rain and snow.
Any change is hard, Durham said, and discussions about using less water in a place with so little precipitation are bound to be prickly. But she said the alternative — a depleted aquifer that can’t support any irrigation — would essentially end life in western Kansas as we know it.
Residents and businesses leaving town. Empty storefronts on Main Street.
“It would be devastating,” Durham said. “You would see the exact thing that we’re trying to prevent.”
The LEMA plan would customize each farmer’s water limits on a case-by-case basis. Those who have been pumping the most would need to cut irrigation by up to 25%. Others who have been voluntarily conserving the most water already might not need to make any changes.
Data from the Kansas Geological Survey shows that the four counties would need to reduce pumping by one-third to stop the aquifer’s depletion over the next decade. In drought conditions like we’re seeing now, they would need to cut pumping by half.
So trimming irrigation by 10% isn’t going to solve the problem permanently. But, Durham said, it’s a start. If this plan can double the aquifer’s lifespan, that could mean it’s still around for the grandchildren of the people who make those changes today.
“This is a huge and significant step,” Durham said, “toward changing what this part of western Kansas could look like in 50 years.”
If the state approves the plan after its second public hearing in early February, it would likely go into effect from the beginning of this year through 2027. Farmers would be able to use their five-year water allotment as they wish, meaning they could pump extra during a dry year as long as they irrigate less in a subsequent year to even things out.
The key to this LEMA program is putting water conservation decisions in the hands of a local board, rather than the state. But that doesn’t mean it’s all kumbaya.
Water has long been a point of contention in dry western Kansas. That’s because water means money. Even as wells run out, pumping the aquifer continues to prop up the regional economy — from corn and wheat growers to irrigation equipment dealers to cattle feedlots.
The groundwater district proposing the new LEMA is the smallest in western Kansas, but it still covers more than one million acres and nearly 2,000 wells. With that many voices in the discussion, it can be a challenge to get everyone on board.
Many irrigators remain wary of any program that might force them to use less water.
Lane County farmer Camron Shay came to the hearing with his own concerns about how the limits could be fair for everyone across a region that has so much diversity in how much water has been used, how much water is needed to nurture a crop and how much water is left.
“It can’t just be done by a bunch of activists,” Shay said, “who come in and don’t know what they’re talking about and strong arm it and do radical things.”
But the locally driven approach of the LEMA may help ease those fears. That was the point of the public hearing and the series of community meetings that came before. After getting some of his questions answered, Shay said, he walked away feeling better about the plan.
“We all know that we have a groundwater problem,” he said. “I don’t know if there’s a good solution for it, but these guys look like they’re at least trying.”
Proof of concept
Fortunately, farmers in the four counties don’t have to look far to find examples of how these irrigation limits work in the real world.
The state’s first LEMA began in a small portion of northwest Kansas a decade ago. The plan was to reduce irrigation by 20%. When the results came in, farmers ended up cutting pumping by nearly one-third. And some of those farmers actually saw profits go upas they spent less to pump water and buy seed and fertilizer.
That initial LEMA was deemed so successful that a similar plan to cover parts of 10 northwest Kansas counties went into effect five years ago — although that expansion faced a lawsuit from dozens of irrigators who said it infringed on their water rights — and was recently renewed for another five years.
And right next to where the new limits are proposed, Wichita County started its own LEMA two years ago to cut irrigation by 25%.
That’s where Brian Bauck sat in a combine harvesting his last cornfield of the year.
Most of his fields are now non-irrigated, or dryland, and the sections that see a center pivot get less water than they did decades ago. So the past year of drought has left its mark.
As he makes one last pass with his combine, its wide green header has to skim the ground to reach the rows of short corn plants out the front window. It scoops up its fair share of dry tumbleweeds that have blown in with the punishing winds, too.
But thanks to new drought-tolerant seed varieties and farming practices that conserve soil and moisture, he had crops to harvest on just about every acre this season.
“It feels great,” Bauck said. “Anytime you can get something, even though it may not be what you wanted, tells you that you’re probably doing a few things right.”
So far, Wichita County’s irrigation restrictions appear to be making a dent in depletion. Countywide aquifer declines averaged 0.54 feet per year from 2010 to 2017, according to Kansas Geological Survey data. But from 2018 to 2021, the county lost an average of 0.09 feet per year. As the programs produce more real-world data, it might reassure crop growers in neighboring areas that irrigation reductions are worth a shot.
Farmers are naturally independent thinkers, Bauck said, so it’s always a challenge when somebody comes in and tries to tell them how to do their jobs. He used to be skeptical about irrigation cuts too.
And changing farmers’ mindsets about water use isn’t a simple task because their livelihoods are at stake. In a dry year like this, turning the sprayer on could make the difference between growing some crops or none at all.
But, he said, the golden kernels filling his grain tank prove that farming with less irrigation can work in western Kansas, even in a historically dry season.
It shows that a future with less water may not be painless, but it is possible. And in western Kansas, he said, it’s a matter of survival.
“Regardless of whether somebody likes it or not,” Bauck said, “we’ve got to do something in order to extend the life of this aquifer, or it’s not gonna be there.”
Gallons and dollars
Another reason for urgency? Climate change. As the H2O buffet dwindles down, Kansas heats up.
With dry western weather shifting eastward, more of the state will likely face a future with worse droughts and less precipitation — a process called aridification.
Vaishali Sharda, assistant professor of biological and agricultural engineering at Kansas State University, studies how a drier, hotter future threatens the state’s farms. Aridification paired with a declining aquifer, she said, sets up a potential time bomb for western Kansas agriculture.
“There is no guessing,” Sharda said. “If we continue irrigating at the pace at which we have done in the past, the Ogallala won’t be able to sustain it.”
Even if irrigators could save a relatively small percentage of the water they’ve been using, the impact could be enormous — simply because of how many gallons we’re talking about.
In the four counties with the proposed LEMA, for instance, 94% of all water used goes to irrigate crops.
Statewide, roughly three-fourths of all water used in Kansas comes from the High Plains aquifer, and nearly all of that goes to irrigation. Over the course of a year, that averages out to 2.5 billion gallons of groundwater used to water crops each day.
But finding consensus on new rules to curb aquifer use is an uphill climb when using that water is the foundation that virtually everything else in western Kansas is built on.
Take southwest Kansas. It has — and uses — the biggest chunk of the state’s aquifer. And its agriculture relies more on irrigation than anywhere else in Kansas. Cattle feedlots, meatpacking plants and dairy farms all depend on the corn feed that’s grown here.
District director Mark Rude expects conversations about irrigation limits — maybe even a new LEMA — to start back up in his district over the next few years. And the district recently began sending its irrigators detailed reports about their water use and comparing it to their neighbors in an attempt to get farmers to change their mindsets.
But even with more information about depletion and conservation than ever, he still believes his members aren’t ready for widespread irrigation cuts. Strict rules to save the aquifer don’t make sense, he said, if they come at the expense of the economy.
“To get growth,” Rude said, “you’ve got to have water.”
He’s exploring a plan to bring in water from the Missouri River — potentially flowing across the state in an aqueduct hundreds of miles long — to replace what’s lost in the Ogallala.
While the district hasn’t figured out how to make that plan’s $18 billion price tag financially feasible, he said, it might be the only way to keep the region’s industries — from corn to cattle to ethanol — booming for future decades.
Converting western Kansas to dryland farming may be sustainable, he said, but it would mean a smaller economy with fewer jobs and fewer people in a region where most counties already struggle with population decline.
The real question, he said, is what kind of economic future does western Kansas want to sustain?
“It’s important that we not forget that what we’re trying to preserve here is not only the community as a whole,” Rude said, “but the business strategy, the overall viability of that community.”
But whether or not a groundwater district or state entity decides to impose irrigation limits, farmers across western Kansas are already adjusting to the realities of a life with less water — because they have to.
Many have adopted smarter irrigation technology, such as soil moisture sensors and systems that customize irrigation rates across a field. Some have switched to crops that require less water than corn, such as cotton.
Others have stopped irrigating entirely on a majority of their acres. That’s the case for Leonard, the farmer with the dry well whose land lies within the southwest Kansas groundwater district.
The thought of leaving irrigation behind, he said, doesn’t have to be scary. In a way, it’s coming full circle.
When his great-grandfather started the Leonard farm, there wasn’t an irrigation well or center pivot in sight. And by the time he retires, Leonard expects his entire farm will return to its dryland roots.
“Life will go on,” Leonard said. “We’re still running a farm here. And it looks a little bit different than it used to but we’re still doing what we love.”
David Condos covers western Kansas for High Plains Public Radio and the Kansas News Service.
The Kansas News Service is a collaboration of KCUR, Kansas Public Radio, KMUW and High Plains Public Radio focused on health, the social determinants of health and their connection to public policy.
Researchers find a more sustainable way to grow crops under solar panels
Translucent solar cells that split the light spectrum could allow for more productive use of arable land.
Kris Holt, Contributing Reporter – January 18, 2023
Andre Daccache/UC Davis
Researchers say they have determined a way to make agrivoltaics — the process of growing crops underneath solar panels — more efficient. They found that red wavelengths are more efficient for growing plants, while the blue part of the spectrum is better for producing solar energy. Solar panels that only allow red wavelengths of light to pass through could enable farmers to grow food more productively while generating power at the same time.
Previous studies have found that agrivoltaics can reduce the amount of water required for crops, since they’re shaded from direct sunlight. Researchers at Michigan Technological University determined in 2015 that shading can reduce water usage by up to 29 percent. Majdi Abou Najm, an associate professor at University of California, Davis’ department of land, air and water resources, told Modern Farmer that by splitting the light spectrum, crops can get the same amount of carbon dioxide with less water while shielding them from heat.
The researchers put the idea to the test by growing tomatoes under blue and red filters, as well as a control crop without any coverings. Although the yield for the covered plots was about a third less than the control, the latter had around twice the amount of rotten tomatoes. Abou Najm noted that the filters helped to reduce heat stress and crop wastage.
A blue filter over crops with a temperature reading super imposed.
For this approach to work in practice, though, manufacturers would need to develop translucent solar panels that capture blue light and allow red light to pass through. Matteo Camporese, an associate professor at the University of Padova in Italy and lead author of a paper on the topic, suggested that translucent, carbon-based organic solar cells could work. These cells could be applied onto surfaces such as glass.
There are other issues, including the fact wavelength-selective agrivoltaic systems may need to account for different crop types. Harvesting those crops efficiently might require some out-of-the-box thinking too. Still, the research seems promising and, with a growing global population, it’s important to consider different approaches to using our resources more productively.
“We cannot feed 2 billion more people in 30 years by being just a little more water-efficient and continuing as we do,” Abou Najm said. “We need something transformative, not incremental. If we treat the sun as a resource, we can work with shade and generate electricity while producing crops underneath. Kilowatt hours become a secondary crop you can harvest.”
Skipped Showers, Paper Plates: An Arizona Suburb’s Water Is Cut Off
Jack Healy – January 16, 2023
A water hauler sets up hoses to fill the tank at a home that is listed for sale in the Rio Verde Foothills outside of Scottsdale, Arizona, on Sunday, Jan. 8, 2023. (Erin Schaff/The New York Times)
RIO VERDE, Ariz. — Joe McCue thought he had found a desert paradise when he bought one of the new stucco houses sprouting in the granite foothills of Rio Verde, Arizona. There were good schools, mountain views and cactus-spangled hiking trails out the back door.
Then the water got cut off.
Earlier this month, the community’s longtime water supplier, the neighboring city of Scottsdale, turned off the tap for Rio Verde Foothills, blaming a grinding drought that is threatening the future of the West. Scottsdale said it had to focus on conserving water for its own residents, and could no longer sell water to roughly 500 to 700 homes — or around 1,000 people. That meant the unincorporated swath of $500,000 stucco houses, mansions and horse ranches outside Scottsdale’s borders would have to fend for itself and buy water from other suppliers — if homeowners could find them, and afford to pay much higher prices.
Almost overnight, the Rio Verde Foothills turned into a worst-case scenario of a hotter, drier climate, showing what happens when unregulated growth collides with shrinking water supplies.
For residents who put their savings into newly built homes that promised desert sunsets, peace and quiet (but relegated the water situation to the fine print), the turmoil is also deeply personal. The water disruption has unraveled their routines and put their financial futures in doubt.
“Is it just a campground now?” McCue, 36, asked one recent morning, after he and his father installed gutters and rain barrels for a new drinking-water filtration system.
“We’re really hoping we don’t go dry by summer,” he said. “Then we’ll be in a really bad spot.”
In a scramble to conserve, people are flushing their toilets with rainwater and lugging laundry to friends’ homes. They are eating off paper plates, skipping showers and fretting about whether they have staked their fates on what could become a desiccated ghost suburb.
Some say they know how it might look to outsiders. Yes, they bought homes in the Sonoran desert. But they ask, are they such outliers? Arizona does not want for emerald-green fairways, irrigated lawns or water parks.
“I’m surrounded by plush golf courses, one of the largest fountains in the world,” said Tony Johnson, 45, referring to the 500-foot water feature in the neighboring town of Fountain Hills.
Johnson’s family built a house in Rio Verde two years ago, and landscaped the yard with rocks, not thirsty greenery. “We’re not putting in a pool, we’re not putting in grass,” he said. “We’re not trying to bring the Midwest here.”
The heavy rain and snow battering California and other parts of the Mountain West over the past two weeks is helping to refill some reservoirs and soak dried-out soil. But water experts say that one streak of wet weather will not undo a 20-year drought that has practically emptied Lake Mead, the country’s largest reservoir, and has strained the overburdened Colorado River, which supplies about 35% of Arizona’s water. The rest comes from the state’s own rivers or from aquifers in the ground.
Last week, Arizona learned that its water shortages could be even worse than many residents realized. As one of her first actions after taking office, Gov. Katie Hobbs unsealed a report showing that the fast-growing West Valley of Phoenix does not have enough groundwater to support tens of thousands of homes planned for the area; their development is now in question.
Water experts say Rio Verde Foothills’ situation is unusually dire, but it offers a glimpse of the bitter fights and hard choices facing 40 million people across the West who rely on the Colorado River for the means to take showers, irrigate crops, or run data centers and fracking rigs.
“It’s a cautionary tale for homebuyers,” said Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University. “We can’t just protect every single person who buys a parcel and builds a home. There isn’t enough money or water.”
Porter said a number of other unincorporated areas in Arizona rely on water service from larger nearby cities like Prescott or Flagstaff. They could find themselves in Rio Verde’s straits if the drought persists and the cities start taking drastic conservation measures.
There are no sewers or water mains serving the Rio Verde Foothills, so for decades, homes there that did not have their own wells got water delivered by tanker trucks. (The homes that do have wells are not directly affected by the cutoff.)
The trucks would fill up with Scottsdale water at a pipe 15 minutes’ drive from the Rio Verde Foothills, and then deliver water directly to people’s front doors. Or rather, to 5,000-gallon storage tanks buried in their yards — enough water to last an average family about a month. When the tanks ran low, homeowners would call or send an electronic signal to the water haulers for another delivery.
It was a tenuous arrangement in the middle of the desert, but homeowners said the water always arrived, and had come to feel almost as reliable as a utility hookup.
Now, though, the water trucks can’t refill close by in Scottsdale, and are having to crisscross the Phoenix metro area in search of supplies, filling up in cities a two-hour round trip from Rio Verde. That has meant more driving, more waiting and more money. An average family’s water bill has jumped to $660 a month from $220, and it is unclear how long the water trucks will be able to keep drawing tens of thousands of gallons from those backup sources.
Heavier water users like Cody Reim, who moved into a starter house in Rio Verde two years ago, are being hit even harder. He said his water bills could now exceed $1,000 a month — more than his mortgage payment. Reim and his wife have four young children, which in normal times meant a lot of dishwashing, countless toilet flushes and dozens of laundry cycles to clean soiled cloth diapers.
Reim, who works for his family’s sheet-metal business, is planning to become his own water hauler, lashing large containers to his pickup and setting out to fill them up. He guesses that fetching water will take him 10 hours every week, but he said he would do anything to stay in Rio Verde. He loves the dark skies and the baying coyotes at night, and how his children can run up and down a dirt road that with views of the Four Peaks Wilderness.
“Even if this place went negative and I’d have to pay somebody to take it, I’d still be here,” he said of his house. “There’s no other option.”
Cities across the Southwest have spent years trying to cut down on water consumption, recharge aquifers and find new ways to reuse water to cope with the drought.
Experts say that most Arizona residents do not have to worry about losing their drinking water any time soon, though deeper cuts loom for agricultural users, who use about 70% of Arizona’s water supply. Phoenix and surrounding cities have imposed few water restrictions on residents.
Rio Verde Foothills once felt like a remote community far from the urban centers of Scottsdale or Phoenix, residents said, a quilt of ranches and self-built houses scattered among mesquite and palo verde trees.
But over the past few years, there has been a frenzy of home construction in the area, fueled by cheap land prices and developers who took advantage of a loophole in Arizona’s groundwater laws to construct homes without any fixed water supply.
To prevent unsustainable development in a desert state, Arizona passed a law in 1980 requiring subdivisions with six or more lots to show proof that they have a 100-year water supply.
But developers in Rio Verde Foothills have been sidestepping the rule by carving larger parcels into sections with four or five houses each, creating the impression of a miniature suburbia, but one that did not need to legally prove it had water.
“It’s a slipped-through-the-cracks community,” said Porter, with the Kyl Center for Water Policy.
Thomas Galvin, a county supervisor who represents the area, says there’s not much the county can do if builders split their parcels into five lots or less to get around the water supply requirement. “Our hands are tied,” he said.
People in Rio Verde Foothills are bitterly divided over how to resolve their water woes.
When some proposed forming their own self-funded water provider, other residents revolted, saying the idea would foist an expensive, freedom-stealing new arm of government on them. The idea collapsed. Other solutions, like allowing a larger water utility to serve the area, could be years off.
On Thursday, a group of residents sued Scottsdale in an effort to get the water turned back on. They argued the city violated an Arizona law that restricts cities from cutting off utility services to customers outside their borders. Scottsdale did not respond to the lawsuit.
Rose Carroll, 66, who is a plaintiff in the suit, said she would support any idea that would keep her from having to kill her donkeys.
She moved to Rio Verde Foothills two years ago, and runs a small ranch for two dozen rescued donkeys who had been abandoned, left in kill pens or doused with acid. The donkeys spend their days in a corral on her seven-acre property, eating hay and drinking a total of 300 gallons of water every day.
Carroll collected rainwater after a recent winter storm, enough for a few weeks’ worth of toilet flushes. The new cost to get water delivered to the ranch could reach an unaffordable $1,800 a month, she said, so she is putting some of the donkeys up for adoption and said she might have to euthanize others if she does not have enough water to keep them alive.
She said she got a call a few days ago, asking her to take in two more abandoned donkeys, but had to say no.
California storms erase extreme drought from nearly all of state
In a single week, the portions of the state classified as experiencing extreme drought in California fell from 27.1% to 0.32%.
David Knowles, Senior Editor – January 12, 2023
Flooding from the Sacramento and American rivers, near downtown Sacramento, Calif., Jan. 11. (Fred Greaves/Reuters)
BERKELEY, Calif. — There is a silver lining to the relentless California storms that have so far killed at least 18 people and racked up an estimated $1 billion in damages: In a single week, extreme drought conditions that had gripped almost one-third of the state have been downgraded nearly everywhere.
The U.S. Drought Monitor released an updated map Thursday that accounts for the series of atmospheric river storms that have doused the state in recent weeks with more than 24 trillion gallons of water. It shows that “extreme drought,” the second-highest classification used by the agency has been all but erased from the interior sections of the state.
A U.S. Drought Monitor map of conditions in California. (U.S. Drought Monitor)
In a single week, the portions of the state classified as experiencing extreme drought in California fell from 27.1% to 0.32%, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Still, 46% of the state remains classified in “severe drought,” though that figure fell from 71% a week ago.
Drought conditions in California from the week of Jan. 3. (U.S. Drought Monitor)
Extreme drought conditions are still widespread in Nevada and Utah, and the California storms have not affected the Colorado River Basin, including the badly depleted reservoirs Lake Mead and Lake Powell, where the federal government has been forced to implement water restrictions.
In order to completely eliminate drought conditions across the American West several consecutive seasons of precipitation at 120% to 200% of normal would need to occur, ABC News reported. A 2022 study published in the journal Nature found that the past 22 years have been the driest period in the Southwest in the last 1,200 years.
As temperatures continue to rise thanks to humankind’s burning of fossil fuels, one effect, called the Clausius-Clapeyron relationship, is that there is 7% more moisture in the atmosphere per every degree Celsius of warming. That means extreme downpours like those in California in recent days can become more likely when conditions are right. By the same token, however, that relationship can also spur what UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain has called “flash droughts,” in which extremely dry conditions can arise quickly, even in a year of above-average precipitation.
“The Clausius-Clapeyron relationship also increases what is known as the vapor pressure deficit,” Swain told Yahoo News in November, which means that “the atmosphere’s potential to act as a giant sponge and extract more water out of the landscape has increased, even if the relative humidity has stayed the same. This Clausius-Clapeyron relationship is actually what drives the atmosphere’s capacity to dry out the landscape faster.”
For now, however, the precipitation picture is much brighter than it was even a week ago. Water levels in depleted state reservoirs have been rising, and California’s snow pack as of Wednesday measured 226% of normal. While the risks of flash flooding remain high, more rain and snow is in the forecast for the coming week.
Developers are trying to build hundreds of thousands of homes in Arizona. New report warns there isn’t enough water.
Brandon Loomis, USA TODAY NETWORK – January 12, 2023
PHOENIX — Amid a megadrought depleting groundwater across the West, a newly released report from Arizona signals difficulty ahead for developers wishing to build hundreds of thousands of homes in the desert west of Phoenix.
Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs released the modeling report Monday, and it shows that plans to add homes for more than 800,000 people west of the White Tank Mountains will require other water sources if they are to go forward. The report also signals the start of Hobbs’ effort to shore up groundwater management statewide.
“We must talk about the challenge of our time: Arizona’s decades-long drought, over-usage of the Colorado River, and the combined ramifications on our water supply, our forests, and our communities,” Hobbs said.
The West’s megadrought which worsened in 2021 made it the driest in at least 1,200 years, according to a study from the journal Nature Climate Change.
As a result of the expanding drought, western states are struggling with a water shortage due to lakes and rivers drying up in addition to communities pumping more groundwater and depleting aquifers at an alarming rate.
The groundwater crisis has impacted agriculture and rural communities as many are losing access to groundwater. Now, new homes will need new water sources, according to Arizona’s modeling report.
The Arizona Department of Water Resources had developed the model showing inadequate water for much of the development envisioned as far-west suburbs, but had not released it during then-Gov. Doug Ducey’s term.
In the case of development on the western edges of the urban area, the information Hobbs’ team released makes clear that developers who own desert expanses largely in Buckeye’s, the westernmost suburb in Phoenix, planning area will need more water to make their visions come true.
The report, called the Lower Hassayampa Sub-basin Groundwater Model, finds that projected growth would more than double groundwater use and put it out of balance by 15%. The state’s groundwater law requires developers in the Phoenix area to get state certificates of assured water supplies extending out 100 years before they can build.
Arizona Water Resources Director Tom Buschatzke on Monday said he would not issue new certificates for the area unless developers find secure water sources in addition to the local groundwater.
Some of the Buckeye subdivisions in the area already have certifications for homes that Buschatzke estimated to number in the thousands, and that will combine to add 50,000 acre-feet of demand in a basin that already uses 123,000 acre-feet. The aquifer apparently can bear that amount, but not the 100,000 acre-foot demand that department analysts have attributed to hundreds of thousands more homes envisioned for the zone.
The Howard Hughes Corp. is a major player in the area, with 100,000 homes planned on 37,000 acres.
The question of where developers might get the water to support such vast housing tracts has previously presented a mystery, with some developers merely saying they were confident in their prospects. The report the state released this week provides an initial answer: They won’t be finding that water solely in the aquifer below the land. Instead, they will have to find new ways of importing and possibly recycling water if they want to build out the property.
“Some of the big plans that are out there for master-planned communities will need to find other water supplies or other solutions,” Buschatzke said.
For now, the groundwater deficiency could stall much building on the Valley’s far west side. But it also could foreshadow a push for big new infrastructure projects, such as an ocean desalination plant and pipeline proposal that a state water finance board has agreed to evaluate. That proposal, led by an Israeli company that has built or operated desalination plants around the world, would pipe water north from Mexico and through Buckeye on its way to the Central Arizona Project canal.
Other options include moving water from other areas, such as the Harquahala Valley to the west, or recycling wastewater, Buschatzke said. Those options could take years, though.
Buckeye officials sent a statement to The Arizona Republic, part of the USA TODAY Network, saying they need time to study the report but will work to ensure sustainable growth: “Buckeye is committed to responsible and sustainable growth and working to ensure we have adequate water for new businesses and residents, while protecting our existing customers.”
Researcher says finding water won’t be cheap or easy
Arizona State University water researcher Kathleen Ferris had called for the groundwater report’s release, and on Tuesday said she was delighted that Hobbs made it public.
Ferris, with the school’s Kyl Center for Water Policy, is a past director of the Department of Water Resources and helped craft the 1980 groundwater law that requires a 100-year supply for new development.
“It’s a hugely important step,” Ferris said. “As the governor said, It’s about transparency and knowledge. We should not be allowing this growth to occur when the water isn’t there.”
Ferris said she counts herself among skeptics who don’t believe a desalination plant will come online quickly. The Colorado River’s drought-reduced storage means it can’t provide excess water to soon fill the gap in groundwater supplies, either. It doesn’t mean Buckeye can’t grow, she said, but finding the water to do so won’t be cheap or easy.
She cautioned that other cities with stronger water portfolios are also on the lookout to snap up new water to secure their own futures.
Beyond Buckeye, Ferris said, Hobbs is right to push for better groundwater management statewide. The 1980 law applied mostly to urban areas, leaving vast areas of rural Arizona unregulated.
The whole state doesn’t necessarily need the same 100-year-supply rule, Ferris said, but groundwater users everywhere should be responsible for tracking and reporting what they use.
Any effort to address rural groundwater with statewide regulations is bound to face resistance in the Arizona Legislature, where lawmakers for several years have declined to extend state regulations.
Whatever happens, Ferris said, the state is due for an honest conversation about where and by how much it can grow. She hopes the governor’s announcement is the start of such a reckoning. “We just can’t have subdivisions approved (solely) on groundwater,” she said.
Gov. Katie Hobbs issued a ‘wake-up call’ on groundwater. Is anyone listening?
Joanna Allhands, Arizona Republic – January 11, 2023
Gov. Katie Hobbs give her State of the State address to the Arizona House of Representatives during the opening session of the 56th Legislature on Jan. 9, 2023, in Phoenix.
Gov. Katie Hobbs called it a “wake-up call” on water.
Whether it is remains to be seen.
The newly elected governor spent a good chunk of her first State of the State address talking about the “challenge of our time: Arizona’s decades-long drought, over usage of the Colorado River, and the combined ramifications on our water supply, our forests and our communities.”
She released a long-awaited model that shows parts of the far West Valley don’t have enough groundwater to sustain all users for the long term (more on that in a second).
And she called for swift action – particularly to address rural groundwater problems that have been festering for decades.
It’s the right tone, but will lawmakers agree?
Hobbs struck the tone that many in the water community have long sought from elected leaders – one that noted we’re not playing around, that there are consequential decisions we must make (and soon) to protect our dwindling water supplies.
There have been rumors aplenty about what may or may not be addressed this session, and right now, there are few answers, particularly on how far lawmakers might be willing to go on water regulation, something they have resisted for years.
Former Rep. Regina Cobb got nowhere on an effort to give rural communities more tools to manage groundwater use and more flexibility to choose which measures best fit their circumstances.
Retooled legislation is expected again this session, with more detail on how these new authorities would work with existing regulations.
And Hobbs is clearly pressing to have this discussion.
Hobbs’ council must have clear goals, deadlines
She told lawmakers she would convene a council to study ways to modernize and expand the Groundwater Management Act of 1980, which created Irrigation Non-expansion Areas and Active Management Areas, as well as an Assured Water Supply program that requires new subdivisions to prove they have a 100-year water supply before lots can be platted.
Hobbs also promised to include money in her proposed budget, due to be released later this week, to support rural communities that want to form Active Management Areas, the state’s most stringent form of groundwater regulation.
Granted, her predecessor created a council to study urban and rural groundwater management, but without strong direction and deadlines, it was generally where ideas went to die.
Hobbs cannot make the same mistake.
What if fast-growing areas can’t grow?
Because, as she correctly noted, real issues are beginning to manifest – even in metro Phoenix, where groundwater management is most robust.
Don’t overlook the significance of the report Hobbs released, one that she and others have claimed was withheld by former Gov. Doug Ducey.
The report found that the Lower Hassayampa groundwater subbasin – which contains Buckeye, one of the fastest-growing cities in the nation – is 4.4 million acre-feet shy of the groundwater it needs to service users for the long haul.
That’s roughly half of what a similar model found in the Pinal Active Management Area south of metro Phoenix. But presuming the state Department of Water Resources treats the Hassayampa subbasin’s imbalance the same way – meaning, it no longer allows developers to grow solely on groundwater – that could have major implications for Buckeye and the massive housing projects that have been proposed nearby.
New subdivisions would all but be shut down in that subbasin, under the state’s Assured Water Supply program, unless developers can secure and count renewable supplies toward their certificates, which are required to plat lots.
Arizona needed a call to arms. Now what?
Whether it’s real or not, there is a lot of fear that lawmakers will try to loosen the rules this session to maintain the status quo on growth in the outskirts, which has heavily relied on groundwater. Hobbs could certainly veto any such effort.
But if we agree to abide by the rules – and we should, because loosening them now would be disastrous for our negotiating position on even more painful Colorado River cuts – we’re going to have to rethink a lot of assumptions about how we continue to grow.
This is not going to be easy work.
Especially if Hobbs’ speech was not the wake-up call she hoped it would be. Or if Rep. Gail Griffin, the chair of the House natural resources committee, continues to be the brick wall upon which all new water regulation explodes.
The governor will need allies willing to go around that wall, if it remains.
But give Hobbs credit for issuing a call to arms. The days of allowing 80% of the state to pump indiscriminately, without ground rules to protect everyone, are over.
And even in areas with regulation, we need to up our game.
Arizona says developers lack groundwater for big growth dreams in the desert west of Phoenix
Brandon Loomis, Arizona Republic – January 11, 2023
The Tartesso community development borders the desert in Buckeye. It’s one of the last noticeable developments on the way out of the Phoenix area.
A newly released state report on groundwater supplies under the desert west of Phoenix signals difficulty ahead for developers wishing to build hundreds of thousands of homes there.
It also signals the start of an effort by Arizona’s new governor to shore up groundwater management statewide.
Gov. Katie Hobbs released the modeling report Monday afternoon, and it shows that plans to add homes for more than 800,000 people west of the White Tank Mountains will require other water sources if they are to go forward.
The Arizona Department of Water Resources had developed the model showing inadequate water for much of the development envisioned as far-west suburbs, but had not released it during then-Gov. Doug Ducey’s term. Hobbs mentioned it during her State of the State address, along with other initiatives, including a new council dedicated to updating the state’s 1980 groundwater protection act for a new era of scarcity.
Hobbs also announced a new Governor’s Office of Resiliency, coordinating agencies, tribal governments and experts in finding land, water and energy solutions for the state.
“We must talk about the challenge of our time: Arizona’s decades-long drought, over-usage of the Colorado River, and the combined ramifications on our water supply, our forests, and our communities,” the governor said.
In the case of development on the western edges of the urban area, the information her team released makes clear that developers who own desert expanses largely in Buckeye’s planning area north of Interstate 10 and west and north of the White Tank Mountains will need more water to make their visions come true.
The report, called the Lower Hassayampa Sub-basin Groundwater Model, finds that projected growth would more than double groundwater use and put it out of balance by 15%. The state’s groundwater law requires developers in the Phoenix area to get state certificates of assured water supplies extending out 100 years before they can build.
Arizona Water Resources Director Tom Buschatzke on Monday said he would not issue new certificates for the area unless developers find secure water sources in addition to the local groundwater.
Some of the Buckeye subdivisions in the area already have certifications for homes that Buschatzke estimated number in the thousands, and that will combine to add 50,000 acre-feet of demand in a basin that already uses 123,000 acre-feet. The aquifer apparently can bear that amount, but not the 100,000 acre-foot demand that department analysts have attributed to hundreds of thousands more homes envisioned for the zone.
The Howard Hughes Corp. is a major player in the area, with 100,000 homes planned on 37,000 acres in the Teravalis development, formerly called Douglas Ranch.
The question of where developers might get the water to support such vast housing tracts has previously presented a mystery, with some developers merely saying they were confident in their prospects. The report the state released this week provides an initial answer: They won’t be finding that water solely in the aquifer below the land. Instead, they will have to find new ways of importing and possibly recycling water if they want to build out the property.
“Some of the big plans that are out there for master-planned communities will need to find other water supplies or other solutions,” Buschatzke said.
Contacted on Tuesday, Howard Hughes Corp. did not respond to an interview request, but did provide a statement from Phoenix Region President Heath Melton: “We support the Governor’s initiative to proactively manage Arizona’s future water supply and will continue to be a collaborative partner with our elected officials, civic agencies, and community stakeholders to drive forward the most modern water management and conservation techniques and help ensure a prosperous and sustainable future for the West Valley, Arizona, and the greater Southwest.”
For now, the groundwater deficiency could stall much building on the Valley’s far west side. But it also could foreshadow a push for big new infrastructure projects, such as an ocean desalination plant and pipeline proposal that a state water finance board has agreed to evaluate. That proposal, led by an Israeli company that has built or operated desalination plants around the world, would pipe water north from Mexico and through Buckeye on its way to the Central Arizona Project canal.
Other options include moving water from other areas, such as the Harquahala Valley to the west, or recycling wastewater, Buschatzke said. Those options could take years, though.
Buckeye officials sent a statement to The Arizona Republic saying they need time to study the report but will work to ensure sustainable growth: “Buckeye is committed to responsible and sustainable growth and working to ensure we have adequate water for new businesses and residents, while protecting our existing customers.”
Arizona State University water researcher Kathleen Ferris had called for the groundwater report’s release, and on Tuesday said she was delighted that Hobbs made it public. Ferris, with the school’s Kyl Center for Water Policy, is a past director of the Department of Water Resources and helped craft the 1980 groundwater law that requires a 100-year supply for new development.
“It’s a hugely important step,” Ferris said. “As the governor said, It’s about transparency and knowledge. We should not be allowing this growth to occur when the water isn’t there.”
Ferris said she counts herself among skeptics who don’t believe a desalination plant will come online quickly. The Colorado River’s drought-reduced storage means it can’t provide excess water to soon fill the gap in groundwater supplies, either. It doesn’t mean Buckeye can’t grow, she said, but finding the water to do so won’t be cheap or easy.
She cautioned, too, that other cities with stronger water portfolios are also on the lookout to snap up new water to secure their own futures.
Beyond Buckeye, Ferris said, Hobbs is right to push for better groundwater management statewide. The 1980 law applied mostly to urban areas, leaving vast areas of rural Arizona unregulated. The whole state doesn’t necessarily need the same 100-year-supply rule, Ferris said, but groundwater users everywhere should be responsible for tracking and reporting what they use. That would help the state know when it must act to conserve stressed aquifers, as it did this winter by halting expansion of irrigated farming around Kingman.
Any effort to address rural groundwater with statewide regulations is bound to face resistance in the Arizona Legislature, where lawmakers for several years have declined to extend state regulations to areas including Kingman. Voters in Cochise County approved a limited management area in November for one groundwater basin.
Whatever happens, Ferris said, the state is due for an honest conversation about where and by how much it can grow. She hopes the governor’s announcement is the start of such a reckoning. “We just can’t have subdivisions approved (solely) on groundwater,” she said.
One advocate for updating and strengthening groundwater protections around the state says she is encouraged that Hobbs has started her administration with moves to do just that.
“We are really encouraged and grateful that water is a top priority,” said Haley Paul, an Audubon Society regional policy director who co-chairs the Water for Arizona coalition.
The Hassayampa groundwater report demonstrates that Arizona needs to do something different now that it can’t rely on excess Colorado River water to backfill pumped groundwater, Paul said. Following a similar finding that has led groundwater depletion to limit Pinal County growth, she said, the report is “a reality check” on unlimited growth in the desert.
Brandon Loomis covers environmental and climate issues for The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com.
Environmental coverage on azcentral.com and in The Arizona Republic is supported by a grant from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
2022 was the 5th warmest year on record, adding further evidence of climate change
The last 8 years have been the warmest 8 on record, the report from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service said.
David Knowles, Senior Editor – January 10, 2023
Motorists drive west toward the setting sun in Long Beach, Calif., during a September heat wave. (Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Planet Earth experienced its fifth warmest year in recorded history in 2022, adding to a streak in which the last eight years have been the hottest on record, thanks to climate change caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
The cause of rising temperatures has long been established. Hundreds of thousands of scientific studies over decades have concluded that the burning of fossil fuels releases greenhouse gases into the Earth’s atmosphere that trap the sun’s ultraviolet radiation and result in warming. While government action around the world has begun to try to limit the emissions causing climate change, the pace of that effort has so far failed to keep temperatures from continuing to rise.
Carbon dioxide concentrations rose by approximately 2.1 parts per million and methane rose by around 12 parts per billion, resulting in an average of approximately 417 ppm for carbon dioxide and 1,894 ppb for methane.
“For both gases these are the highest concentrations from the satellite record,” the Copernicus Climate Change Service wrote in its report. “By including other records, they are the highest levels for over 2 million years for carbon dioxide and over 800,000 years for methane.”
Some of the findings on 2022 global changes in climate from a study by the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service. (Reuters)
Average global temperatures have risen by 2.1 degrees Fahrenheit since the start of the Industrial Revolution. Climate scientists say that is enough to have set off a cascade of consequences, many of which were seen around the world last year.
Since carbon atoms released into the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels can remain there for hundreds of years, the so-called greenhouse effect causing temperatures to rise is expected to continue to worsen over the coming decades, absent a coordinated global effort to dramatically curb emissions.
“We are on a fast track to climate disaster: Major cities under water. Unprecedented heat-waves. Terrifying storms. Widespread water shortages. The extinction of a million species of plants and animals,” Guterres said in a written statement.
