This is a really poor illustration, because it only includes Lake Oroville, which is a reservoir. Reservoirs <i>exist</i> to be tapped like this and drained down. Even a small drought would see a significant change in the water level for a reservoir.
Maybe California should re-evaluate their relationship with agriculture.<p><i>"But California grows so much of our nation's food! What would we eat without them!"</i> you exclaim. Well, I actually agree with you. For the sake of a stable society, it is important that our supply of food remain uninterrupted. Food is essential to the US, and California is essential to the US's food supply.<p>Fucking pistachios <i>are not</i> though. Tax the ever-loving shit out of any farmer growing bullshit luxury crops like that, and quit blaming regular Californian citizens who just want to take a nice shower after a hard days work for all the missing water.<p>Oh, and somebody fix the "save water" propaganda to include some notion of watersheds and aquifers. I've met 3 people recently who don't understand that my [mis]use of fresh water has fuck all to do with California's water supply. I am sick of explaining that my supply of water neither flows out of nor into California.
Nobody doubts there's a serious drought here in California, but those "before and after" photos (2011 vs. 2014) are misleading and likely show seasonal variance.<p>I can find photos predating the "before" images that make Lake Oroville look like a parched wasteland:
<a href="http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518597" rel="nofollow">http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518597</a>
<a href="http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518170" rel="nofollow">http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518170</a>
<a href="http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518629" rel="nofollow">http://www.panoramio.com/photo/17518629</a><p>Those were uploaded in 2009 (the camera used was announced in 2006, so that's a three-year window).<p>Yes, there's a drought. Yes, 80 percent of the developed water supply in California is used by agriculture. But not accounting for seasonal variation in a state with a dry vs. rainy season doesn't do the argument justice.
I'm curious how much water the various water projects in California lose to evaporation. The All-American Canal goes through the desert and is uncovered, for example. It seems like people have talked about covering them with solar cells, but it might be valuable just to cover them with anything.
A really interesting article was posted about 6 months ago that covered some of the history and drama around the state's aging water projects:<p><a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/02/american-aqueduct-the-great-california-water-saga/284009/" rel="nofollow">http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/02/american...</a>
Now, I know nothing about Earth science, but is this not at least a little bit expected given that this is a man made lake? Can I see some pictures of natural lakes in this area? Obviously the drought is bad, because this isn't common and looks very worrisome - but how much of this is just due to this lake basically being a giant swimming pool?
Unfortunately, California (and the American West) have experienced droughts on the order of decades or centuries, and in the fairly recent past. So it could get so much worse:<p><a href="http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/res/div/ocp/drought/medieval.shtml" rel="nofollow">http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/res/div/ocp/drought/medieval.sh...</a>
For a comparison to historical averages, see California Department of Water Resoruces Reservoir Conditions. Where the historical average calls for about 2/3 capacity, most reservoirs are at about 1/3, some markedly less (10%).<p>You'll get percent-of-average from Reservoir Water Storage (By Hydrologic Region), with historical data for selected years to 1977.<p>A plot for Lake Oroville showing annual patterns for current, wet, and dry years: Lake Oroville Storage Level Graph.<p>URLs in the Reddit comment below, apologies but moblie cut & paste stinks.<p><a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/2ebhyx/images_3_years_apart_showing_the_severity_of/cjycrx5" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/2ebhyx/images_3_ye...</a><p><a href="http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/resapp/resDetailOrig.action?resid=ORO" rel="nofollow">http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/resapp/resDetailOrig.action...</a><p><a href="http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/reservoirs/STORAGEW" rel="nofollow">http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/reservoirs/STORAGEW</a><p><a href="http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/products/rescond.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/products/rescond.pdf</a>
From 5 days ago: <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2eawhw/how_serious_is_california_drought_check_out_these/" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/2eawhw/how_serious_is_...</a>
How about a picture of a farmer harvesting the rice he's growing with the "ultra scarce" water?<p>... 'Cause whatever droughts look like, that isn't it.
Makes you wonder if this is indeed a permanent change in the earth's water distribution, rather than just a time of low flow rates. I don't think our climate models can predict it. Not because of atmosphereic, but because of geothermal. We can predict atmospheric, but geothermal is as unpredictable as earthquakes.
This is how you do a real drought - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000s_Australian_drought" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000s_Australian_drought</a><p>Basically 10 years of below average rainfall. Melbourne's water storages got down to about 25% at one point and I seem to recall you basically can't use the last 20%.<p>There were terrible bushfires in 2002, 2006 and 2009 and farmers needed a fair bit of relief from the government but life went on (with water restrictions).<p>The worst part of the drought was the Victorian government decided to build one of the worlds biggest desal plants (will cost the state about $30b over its lifetime), which was delayed in being finished because the drought broke.<p>They have not used any water from it.
Meanwhile Beverly Hill and other wealthy areas have 5000 gallon water trucks coming in to private properties each day.<p>Where do they think that water is coming from.
Southern California is a result of big government messing around with the market to disastrous consequences. If it was worthwhile for people to live in California, then the market would've built the necessary irrigation, without Army Corps of Engineers meddling.
Picture these pictures in reverse but at a coastline then think of the dry after as the normal before and the water as the after.<p>As a person who lives on a very low island, average 20m asl, climate change is going to be rough :{