Bridge bridge

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Bridge bridge

Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck.

It’s too early yet (Feb. 25, 2007) for the cottonwoods to be leafing out, but it seems worthwhile for phenological purposes to note when things aren’t happening as well as when they are – to sort of bracket the phenomenon. This is from a nice midday bike ride with Miguel, down around the junk yard loop. It was taken where the bike trail goes under the Bridge Boulevard bridge. I like it that Albuquerque has a Bridge bridge.

Two weeks ago, there were cranes aplenty in the fields down at the Old Schwartzman farm, but we didn’t see any today. That’s one of the clues that we’re on the cusp of spring – cranes gone, cottonwoods not yet ready to go, temperatures up in the mid-40s (~7 C), that middle ground where I’m not quite comfortable shedding the winter cycling gear, but then I end up zipping and unzipping the jacket and switching back and forth between heavy and light gloves, trying to get comfy.

Not that I’m complaining. It was a lovely ride.

Adaptation

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From Happisburgh, on Britain’s eastern coast, an interesting story about the way adaptation decisions end up being made not at some global level, but one crumbling seawall at a time:

Ronan Uhel, a top official at the European Environment Agency in Copenhagen, said the situation in Happisburgh shows that governments and insurance companies have finally started letting the public know that it will have to do more than buy fuel-efficient cars and better light bulbs to fight global warming.

He said citizens are being shown they can’t keep building homes on islands and near lowlands and coastlines, especially in vulnerable areas where it no longer makes sense to rebuild offshore barriers.

In countries like Britain, “a national debate is just starting about what is an appropriate policy of adaptation to climate change,” Uhel said in an interview. “People are just beginning to realize the risks of global warming and the big lifestyle changes that may be needed to brace for them.”

Late last year, a new law took effect in England and Wales whereby the government decides whether it makes sense, economically and environmentally, to rebuild barriers.

For Happisburgh, 135 miles northeast of London, the answer was no.

“Basically, whatever we do to reduce greenhouse emissions we’re going to face about one meter (3.3 feet) sea level rise on the east coast of England in the next 100 years,” Clive Bates, a top official at the British government’s Environment Agency, told The Associated Press.

Report on Nothing Terribly New

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Map of Arid Lands

Tom Yulsman, in the comments below, raises an interesting question about yesterday’s release of the National Research Council Colorado River report:

[N]othing in the NRC report sounded terribly new. We knew that droughts much worse than what we’ve experienced in the last 100 years have occurred in the past, we knew that the river is over-appropriated, and we basically knew that global warming could make drought even worse.

Tom’s right about this. There was nothing in the report’s central findings that I hadn’t already reported, by me and the rest of the throng of Wallace Stegner wannabes writing about water in the West. But that is not meant to be a criticism. In fact, it’s a great report, and I went to some lengths to give it a good ride in this morning’s paper.
Tom’s got his own take on it, but he’s got an interesting point. By definition, the charge of a panel like this is to assemble the existing science. There’s not supposed to be anything new in it. So why is this “news”? Continue reading ‘Report on Nothing Terribly New’ »

A Gloomy Water Future

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The NAS Colorado River report was released this morning:

Recent studies of past climate and streamflow conditions have broadened understanding of long-term water availability in the Colorado River, revealing many periods when streamflow was lower than at any time in the past 100 years of recorded flows. That information, along with two important trends—a rapid increase in urban populations in the West and significant climate warming in the region—will require that water managers prepare for possible reductions in water supplies that cannot be fully averted through traditional means. Successful adjustments to these new conditions will entail strong and sustained cooperation among the many entities involved in Colorado River water management and science programs.

Pielke Watch

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update: Looks like William Connolley, whose qualifications to deal with this issue are above reproach, has done a nice update on the Roger Pielke Jr. WikiThing.
In a recent comment thread, I facetiously threatened to start a new Inkstian feature:

I think I’m gonna start a new “Pielke watch” feature on Inkstain, where I highlight people going all apoplectic about Roger. That guy’s like waving a red rag in front of you guys. :-)

My idea was to take Roger Pielke Jr.’s picture and PhotoShop a big target over his face. But after the whole Eli incident, I decided that’d be a bad idea.

I was kidding, but the whole BlogoFuror over Roger’s Wikipedia entry is such a classic example that I couldn’t resist. Someone – we’ll call him or her “24.99.142.88″ – thought that the most important thing worth ‘splainin’ about Roger’s work was that he was once invited to write a paper for the Cato Institute’s Regulation. There follows in the Wikipedia history an attempt to point out that he’s also written for liberal publications, and further edits to question the liberalness of the alleged liberal publications, with the result that Wikipedia readers are left with an absolutely vapid entry solely devoted to dueling tribal labels but no discussion of what the guy actually thinks!

And then Roger blogged about it. Which was really waving a red flag in front of David Roberts, whose Pielke Pathology is up there with the best of ’em, and whose “journalistic” analysis of Roger’s views (not unlike “24.99.142.88”) seems to consist largely of an ad hominem critique. And then Steve Bloom, who is worse than any of them when it comes to Pielke Pathology (see the above-referenced comment thread), joins the party!

All that’s left is for Eli Rabbett to chime in, and we’ll have the full Pielke Pathology trifecta. Eli?

Water in the Desert

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Water in the Desert

Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck.

Mountainair, New Mexico, is not technically a desert. It averages nearly 15 inches (~40 cm) of precipitation a year. Nearly half of that falls in the summer rainy season, from late June into September, in big rapid thunderstorms.

With essentially no surface water for miles around, the ranchers dig stock tanks like this, carving out a depression along a drainage and piling up the dirt they remove into a berm that serves as a dam to hold back runoff for the cattle to drink. We saw this one on a drive Friday with Mom and Dad between Mountainair and Gran Quivira.

Albuquerque from the Train

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dad_train_4

Originally uploaded by heinemanfleck.

It is very likely that this is the first view my Dad ever had of Albuquerque, riding the train across American more than three score years ago, a Pennsylvania boy on his way to California for the first time. I didn’t mean to get his reflection in the picture. In fact, I didn’t even notice it until I was downloading ’em just now. When I took it, I was thinking, “This is the first view lots of people have had of Albuquerque, coming in on the train.”

It didn’t occur to me at the time that Dad was one of them.

More snaps from the trip.