Global warming: a rise in river flows raises alarm

The volume of fresh water pouring from the world’s rivers has risen rapidly since 1994, in what  researchers say is further evidence of global warming. The study, led by a team at UC Irvine, is the first to estimate global fresh-water flow into the world’s oceans using observations from new satellite technology rather than through computer or hydrological models.

Published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study found that annual fresh-water flow increased 18% from 1994 to 2006, suggesting an acceleration in the global water cycle of evaporation and rainfall, which influences the intensity of storms, floods and droughts.

UC Irvine Earth System Science professor Jay Famiglietti, the principal investigator, said that the data have major implications for California, where warmer temperatures are already triggering earlier snow melt. Rising sea levels are expected to significantly alter the state’s long coastline.

“Until now, we have had no continuous record of global-scale river discharge,” said Famiglietti. He noted that the time period of the study was short, but added, "If these trends persist, they will be a smoking gun that the water cycle intensification, predicted by climate scientists, is already upon us."

Globally, river flows are often a politically-fraught subject. Countries measure the quantity of water locally, and inconsistently, with mechanical or electronic guages, but they often refuse to share the data, according to hydrologist Peter Gleick, editor of the biannual "World's Water" survey and director of the Oakland-based Pacific Institute think tank. Pakistan and India are in conflict over flows from the Indus. Israelis, Palestinians and Lebanese all depend on the Jordan River. Ten countries are sharing water along the Nile.

The UC Irvine study “is additional clear evidence that the hydrological cycle is accelerating,” Gleick said. "This is exactly what climate modelers have said would happen from climate change, and now we see it happening. How much more evidence do we need before we take action against climate change?”

In the hydrological cycle, as grade-schoolers learn, fresh water evaporates from the oceans, rains onto the land and flows into rivers which then empty into the oceans. The increase in fresh-water flow, documented in the paper, was the missing element that complemented existing evaporation, rainfall and sea level rise data, proving that the cycle is speeding up, Famiglietti said.

"If the water cycle intensifies, then we will see more frequent, more intense floods, and more persistent drought," he said. He noted that because of atmospheric circulation patterns, the impact will be uneven, with stronger rainfall and more severe storms in the tropics and the Arctic, and more drought in temperate regions such as California.

UC Irvine last year opened the UC Center for Hydrologic Modeling, directed by Famiglietti, which will do more specific climate-related studies on California, such as the implications of groundwater depletion in the Central Valley.

The study found that the 13-year increase in fresh-water discharge of 540 cubic kilometers was mostly due to rapid evaporation from the oceans, which led to more rainfall on land. Only 10% of the increase in discharge could be attributed to melting ice sheets in Greenland and the Antarctic, although those sources are expected to be a growing proportion as earth's temperatures rise, Famiglietti said.

Other causes for the rise in river flows include melting glaciers and permafrost on land, and practices such as groundwater pumping for irrigation.

"Given the importance of water and the impact of climate change, we need a comprehensive global monitoring network that can measure water stocks and fluxes," Famiglietti said. "We need ground-based measurements of snow, ice, permafrost, lake levels, river flows, soil moisture and groundwater levels. We need dedicated satellite missions. The technology is all there. We just need to make the investment in the ground, and in remote observations, and in the predictive models to synthesize them."

The lead author on the paper, which was funded by NASA, is Tajdarul Syed of the Indian School of Mines, who did most of the research as a graduate student and postdoctoral associate under Famiglietti. Other authors are Don Chambers of the University of South Florida, Joshua Willis of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, and Kyle Hilburn of Remote Sensing Systems in Santa Rosa, CA.

-- Margot Roosevelt

Photo: Professor Jay Famiglietti. Credit: Daniel A. Anderson / UC Irvine

Comments

[DangerMouse]

Got the answer! National Geographic states limited nuclear events can reverse global warming!

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/02/110223-nuclear-war-winter-global-warming-environment-science-climate-change/

So - we set off some nukes here:
1. Capital when Congress is in session
2. Sacramento when Assembly in session
3. Any Bar Association and Government Union leader meeting
4. Wherever Lindsay, Charlie and Christina are at the same time.

Many problems solved with one stone.

[DangerMouse]

OMG - a river rose? A sure sign of global warming.

Has anyone mentioned mean temps on all the planets in our solar system is rising proportionally?

Is this because man's carbon footprint is so much more powerful a force than the sun?

Thinking that somehow the sun's affect is supposed to be somehow regulated like a thermostat is like thinking the world flat.

[phodges]

more droughts and more floods?

not to mention, the earth has been COOLING the last 8 years of study.

and the study concludes that water evaporates over the ocean, falls on land, and flows back to ocean? DOH! with pacific decadal oscillation going negative we will see even more of this...rain, that is.

why does every study of otherwise useful information have to hing on global warming? oh, because that's where their funding comes from!

more CO2 is better, and warmer would be better...if it were really getting warmer, that is. that's why all those recent times when it was warmer are called....climacitc OPTIMUMS!

taxing and trading CO2 has absolutely nothing to do with "green" or the environment, and everything to do with making the rich richer and the poor poorer. it is just another scam to take money from those who work and give it to those who don't - bankers and investors.

the entire green movement has been hijacked by the AGW industry. such a shame, no more real environmental or progressive work is being accomplished.

the banks and oil companies are laughing all the way to the bank...or to their bahamas hideways

[JSF]

In response to Joe Duck:
'

Don't follow why increased freshwater flows are a bad thing, as fresh water is the most pressing need in many areas and this implies a form of natural desalinization of sea water on a massive scale. Drought problems generally relate to less river flow, not more.

So if the study found a *decrease in freshwater flows* the conclusion would have been that - in the area of river flow - we have nothing to worry about from climate change?

Posted by: Joe Duck | October 06, 2010 at 09:57 AM'

The increase river flow is a sign that pace of the water cycle may already be quickening. While in general more water is good, too much of a good thing is not. At issue is an increase in the intensity and frequency of storms, including the big ones. Those...are not good.

How can we get more drought and greater river flows at the same time? That's because the changes in rain and snowfall are not uniform over the world. Precipitation is increasing at high latitudes, like in the Arctic, and at low latitudes, in the Tropics. That leaves the mid-latitudes, like Southern California for example, drying out with more drought expected in the future.

[JSF]

In response to TH:
'James Famiglietti cannot be taken seriously unless he challenges the US Army Corp of Engineers, et al, and their approach to flood control. Hydrologists and engineers continue to design water conveyances that discharge precipitation prematurely into our rivers and oceans without allowing responsible infiltration and recharge of groundwater. That damage to the hydrologic cycle is indeed anthropogenic. He should write a book called The Whore's Approach to Science and Engineering. Instead he pursues additional funding based upon a paradigm already known as a null hypothesis. That new sucking sound is the Quasi-Environmental (Earth System) Scientists sucking in every dollar they can from the uneducated public.'

Sorry TH, I had trouble concentrating on your comment. There was a loud, annoying sucking sound that was distracting me while I was starting to work on my new book =0

[JSF]

In response to Snircle:
'"Given the importance of water and the impact of climate change, we need a comprehensive global monitoring network that can measure water stocks and fluxes," Famiglietti said. "We need ground-based measurements of snow, ice, permafrost, lake levels, river flows, soil moisture and groundwater levels. We need dedicated satellite missions. The technology is all there. We just need to make the investment in the ground, and in remote observations, and in the predictive models to synthesize them."

Your tax dollars at work.'

Yes Snircle, that's true, but only if you expect to drink, eat and bathe.

[peter]

http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thegwpf.org%2Fnews%2F1593-thanet-wind-farm-will-milk-britions-of-billions.html&sa=D&usg=AFQjCNGJebjtnyvSwhl4AAtcAI5-syrN7A

link on British Thanet offshore wind farm boondoogle:

"In all the publicity given to the opening of "the world's largest wind farm" off the Kent coast last week, by far the most important and shocking aspect of this vast project was completely overlooked. Over the coming years we will be giving the wind farm's Swedish owners a total of £1.2 billion in subsidies. That same sum, invested now in a single nuclear power station, could yield a staggering 13 times more electricity, with much greater reliability."

The big lie about no of green jobs created from green energy tech is also repeatedly used by CA advocates of AB32:

"A final claim for the Thanet wind farm (which Mr Huhne boasts is "only the beginning") is that it will create "green jobs" – although the developers say that only 21 of these will be permanent. These are thus costing, in "green subsidies" alone,£3 million per job per year, or £57 million for each job over the next 20 years. The Government gaily prattles about how it wants to create "400,000 green jobs", which on this basis would eventually cost us £22.8 trillion, or 17 times the entire annual output of the UK economy."

CA has at least 1/2 dozen large-scale alternative energy projects(two will be hybrid solar/nat gas plants) in Mohave Desert at proposed or complete stage, which will cost 10+billions , and which will provide at most 1000 permanent jobs, and no more than several thousand temporary construction jobs at any one time. AB32 proponent's talk of creating 'millions' of jobs in green tech are a total crock.

[peter]

Global warming is fraud science. Cap and trade is dead at the national level and China pollutes at 10,000 times the rate of CA. Go ahead, make CA a job dead state with AB32. What CA does has no impact upon rest of world which will go ahead with max resource extraction and spew out those greenhouse gasses. Meanwhile CA will 'import' 10 million more illegals(carbon polluters) who may actually need blue collar jobs like working on offshore oil rigs. Environmental extremism is good if one can ignore the 1000+ sq miles of polluting 3rd world ghettos spread all over the LA Basin, filled with inconvenient immigrants who may actually need work in blue collar/trades jobs in 'dirty' smokestack industries.

Global climate warming is a massive scam based on misleading, even fraud science, like Piltdown man. So what if a few glaciers are melting and the oceans rise 1-2 ft in 100 years. Earth has had violent geologic/climatic upheavals all its history without man's impact--review the Little Ice Age.

[peter]

Chinese COAL MONSTER burns 3 billion tons of coal a year. They spew likely 10,000 times more GHG emissions than CA and are opening 2 new 500 MW coal plants per week. So what CA does means nothing as far as worldwide GHG emissions.

If environmentalists are really serious about GHG emissions they would have pushed for more nuclear energy in USA. Why are we still burning GHG-belching coal for 50% of total US power generation, and not converting to relatively clean natural gas and zero GHG emission Nuclear power for most of our power?

Wind and solar cannot compete price wise with cheaper fossel fuels in industrial-scale energy except thru heavy gov subsidies, with attendant hikes in electric bills for homes and businesses, and will not solve problems of GHG emissions from transport sector.

Great Britain and Germany are much farther along in developing and implementing AB32 type green energy policies, and in both cases alternative green energy is still only 3% (GB) and 10 %(GER) of total energy production. In both cases their consumers are paying higher electric bills due to gov feed-in tariffs/ subsidies for green energy development

[peter]

"Scientists say that gases from industry and transportation are heating the planet and already have begun to affect California, with melting snow packs and rising sea levels." That is a complete fabricated distortion. Global science warming(AGW) has been shown to be based upon faulty scientific research and even fraudulent data coverups(climategate).

A lot of global warming statements are simply cassandra sky-is-falling scaremongering by environmental extremists. Much global warming research is based on questionable, perhaps even biased agenda- driven science research. Assuming these findings are even correct, how can a 3-7 cm rise in sea levels per decade have any significant effect upon CA, when tides rise and fall as much as 4-6 ft twice a day! Since most of CA coast is high bluffs i doubt a 1-2 " sea level rise over a decade would affect Californians much. except for a few Malibu property owners. Maybe a few owners of expensive CA coastal properties, who may see their properties erode out to sea (along with their prop values), are behind AB32

[peter]

http://www.inlandenergy.com/projectpalmdale.html

"In response to the looming shortage of electric generating capacity facing Southern California and to help generate local economic growth, the City of Palmdale unanimously voted on September 13, 2005 to develop a 570 megawatt (MW) “hybrid” power plant near Plant 42."

"PHPP will be the nation’s first “hybrid” plant, combining the ultra high efficiency of the modern natural gas fired combined cycle technology with the proven renewable design of a solar thermal system, using parabolic trough mirrors to capture the sun’s energy and turn it into electricity. Much like a hybrid car, this approach combines the best features of two-state-of-the-art technologies to produce a design that is an improvement over either one as stand-alone technologies. The result will be the cleanest and most efficient fossil fuel fired plant in the world"

CA is meeting it's renewable energy mandate by allowing hybrid plants to be built, which are combination nat gas/solar power plants, or hybrids.
The solar portion will contribute 9% of plants total energy production, a whopping 50 MW. We have heard all these fantasy plans of CA AB32 nuts that CA will wean itself off of evil GHG-belching fossil fuels, yet CA regulators allowed the PHPP plant to be put up which burns 90% 'evil' fossil-fuel natural gas.

[JSF]

Why did this study begin with the year 1994?

The first satellite to measure sea level rise, TOPEX, was launched in 1994. Since the study used sea level rise information as a key dataset, that's when we started.

Is the reported rise in river flows unprecedented, or is it just the status taken at a very short snapshot in time?

The rise has likely been going building over the last few decades. However, the approach used in the paper can only be applied since 1994, so conclusions are limited to that timeframe.

[JeffM]

Why did this study begin with the year 1994?

Is the reported rise in river flows unprecedented, or is it just the status taken at a very short snapshot in time?

[Marcos El Malo]

Let me make this simple, in case any of the climate deniers are really ignorant and not just shills for Big Oil.

1) The water from the increased water flow is not going into the watertable, i.e., ground water.

2) Think of snowpack as natural water reservoirs. If the snowpack all melts, we don't have that resource. It's gone and won't make it into the water table.

[Mike simms]

When you consider that over 100 countries, and 90% of the top scientists from both the free world (relying on grants) and the communist world (Govt funded) agree that Global Warming is a problem, that is enough for me. I know, having worked with scientists, that getting just 10% of them to agree on ANYTHING is near to impossible. The oil industry is feeding and sponsoring the tea party movement, so these bithering so called right wingers are spewing the same crap they're being fed. Here's a question; If there is was only a 10% chance that global warming was man caused, and we could do something about it, does it make sense to do nothing? If there is only a 20% chance that you will die a violent death by taking strolls downtown after midnight would you risk it? Why? Big Oil has these fools in a trance. Remember the first reports that cigarettes caused cancer. People fought about it for decades! Different era, same fools.

[Mike Lizzi]

A look at the comments will show that this article is providing more fodder for the anti climate change folks. The reason? Up till now, blogs about the consequences of climate change have emphasized the expansion of deserts and the number and intensity of droughts. Now a climate scientist says "an acceleration in the global water cycle of evaporation and rainfall" was in the model all the time. I expected that. But that is not what was being publicized by environmental blogs. Environmental scientists need to listen to what is being said by their supporters, some of whom are going hysterical and making good scientists look like fools.

[jaykimball]

In Reply to Joe Duck comment:

Correct. The increased water flow is a sign of increased snow pack melt, which is a result of global warming, and predicted by the climate models. And as the snowpack melts, it exposes the mountain surface, which is darker than the white snow, which absorbs the suns energy, rather than reflecting it the way the snow did. This absorption of heat further accelerates the snowpack melt. Once the snowpack is gone, it is GONE. For California, this will impact the colorado and Sacramento rivers among others. This is why California is investing billions in water storage, to try to catch rainfall to mitigate loss of snowpack melt that is in our future.

This should not be confused with another attribute of global warming - drought. We are heating the planet up and drought is becoming more widespread. As are associated fires and crop loss due to dryness and heat.

And though drought is increasing, we still have storms, and when they happen, they are more extreme.

For more on this, click on my name below, and when you get to 8020 Vision, on the right side are a list of topics. Click on the water or climate change topics and you will see a variety of articles on the subject.

Thanks!

jay Kimball
8020 Vision

[jaykimball]

For the articles below, go to 8020 Vision (you can click on my name above and it should take you there) and click on the Climate Change topic on the right side.

You will find several pertinent articles on how business leaders are taking the lead and pushing for government action on climate change.

ARTICLE 1
When Walmart CEO Lee Scott first articulated a sustainable vision for Walmart in 2005 he said “We must operate in a world that is healthy.“ A healthy world = healthy consumer = healthy business. For an example of how the biggest business in the world is partnering with one of the greenest, at 8020 Vision, see: walmart-partnering-with-patagonia-on-sustainable-business-practices

ARTICLE 2
A diverse bunch of CEOs from Lockheed, GE, Cummins, Bank of America, Kleiner Perkins, Xerox and Microsoft layout their concerns on climate change, and a need for rapid transition to renewable energy, and their plan on how to get there, at 8020 Vision, see: top-business-leaders-deliver-clean-energy-plan/

ARTICLE 3
Also, as the world warms, insurers are trying to cover their exposure. See Lloyd's view of climate and energy security, at 8020 Vision, see: sustainable-energy-security-strategic-risks-and-opportunities-for-business/

ARTICLE 4
And finally, for insight into the impact on agribusiness, see the Department of Agricultures excellent paper at 8020 Vision, under Recommended Reading see the USDA report under the On Food heading.

ARTICLE 5
And on the investment side, Jeremy Grantham, savvy money manager sums up his investment perspective on climate change, at 8020 Vision, see: jeremy-grantham-everything-you-need-to-know-about-global-warming-in-5-minutes/

[jaykimball]

Though the media plays up the extreme ends of the issue, mainstream business is concerned about the changing climate. Working with business, I haven't met an executive that thinks the climate is cooling. They are paying attention to warming trends, and how it will impact business directly, and indirectly, as it impacts the consumer. Moving beyond the rhetoric of left and right, business is building a base in the pragmatic middle.

The world is warming. We are largely the cause. We can do something about it.

Jay Kimball
8020 Vision

[Alan]

I'm tired of non scientific people making this into a something its not. If you don't hold a scientific degree your comments are just that comments. Scientist make mistakes but the scientific process is the check and balance politics doesn't have.

Bottomline nobody seems to regard this planet as our "space ship". We are already on a great voyage until we can figure out how to do it long term in a ship of our own construction. From this perspective alone, it should be a NO BRAINER that we must be good stewards (and we are grossly inept). Even if you don't think "Climate Change" is a problem, or hasn't been settled fine. But you can't argue with cleaning up the place because the last time I checked, there are no other options for a home.

[TH]

James Famiglietti cannot be taken seriously unless he challenges the US Army Corp of Engineers, et al, and their approach to flood control. Hydrologists and engineers continue to design water conveyances that discharge precipitation prematurely into our rivers and oceans without allowing responsible infiltration and recharge of groundwater. That damage to the hydrologic cycle is indeed anthropogenic. He should write a book called The Whore's Approach to Science and Engineering. Instead he pursues additional funding based upon a paradigm already known as a null hypothesis. That new sucking sound is the Quasi-Environmental (Earth System) Scientists sucking in every dollar they can from the uneducated public.

[Terry Black]

According to NASA, the hottest year ever on record is this one.

The science of climate change is unequivocal. Every peer-reviewed scientific journal accepts the reality of man-made climate change. You can read more here:

http://www.logicalscience.com/consensus/consensusD1.htm

[Joe Duck]

Don't follow why increased freshwater flows are a bad thing, as fresh water is the most pressing need in many areas and this implies a form of natural desalinization of sea water on a massive scale. Drought problems generally relate to less river flow, not more.

So if the study found a *decrease in freshwater flows* the conclusion would have been that - in the area of river flow - we have nothing to worry about from climate change?

[CJ]

Please read http://www.isthereglobalwarming.com/

How can one site show proof that there is global warming and another site show proof that there is not. My concern is that the site that shows proof that there is NO global warming looks more credible. What do you think?

[Danan]

The premise is that everything is bad. The worldwide drought theory is not panning out, so lets say the rivers are rising is bad.
Does anyone remember the children s story "chicken little"?

Why is it so impossible to consider
1. Global warming is a normal cycle and not man caused
2. That global warming is good, just like spring coming out of winter is good.
3. Ignoring the geologic cycles and only looking at a snapshot. It is like comparing April to December and saying we are going to burn up. We are STILL in a geologic ice age that started 2.4 million years ago. We are in an INTERGLACIAL period. Glacial periods are incorrectly but popularly called Ice Ages (capitalized).

[MeghanNRDC]

Indeed. This is what global warming looks like: bit.ly/cAPVEl

[Snircle]

"Given the importance of water and the impact of climate change, we need a comprehensive global monitoring network that can measure water stocks and fluxes," Famiglietti said. "We need ground-based measurements of snow, ice, permafrost, lake levels, river flows, soil moisture and groundwater levels. We need dedicated satellite missions. The technology is all there. We just need to make the investment in the ground, and in remote observations, and in the predictive models to synthesize them."

Your tax dollars at work.

[Mikey]

The debate is weather it is or is not anthropogenic.

[MR. RIGHT]

Oh, please, spare us the BS, this whole business of climate change, global cooling, global warming or whatever the environazis are calling it this week is nothing but a SCAM proliferated by hypocrites like Al Gore who flies around in his private jet, runs up tens of thousands of dollars in home electric bills while making HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS off "carbon offsets" paid to a company owned by Al Gore & "scientists" who are ALL profiting immensely from taxpayer "grants".

You Liberal-Lewzers must think we're not wise to your Bravo Sierra!
Point, Game, Set, Match.

Enviromentalists are like watermelons...green on the outside, red in the inside.

I'm tired of my hard-earned tax dollars going to con-artists like Al Gore and George Soros (Obama gave Soros' investment in Brazil's PETROBRAS a BILLION DOLLAR LOAN FROM THE USA to drill off-shore while putting tens of thousands of Americans out of work in the Gulf with the Obama moratorium) & "climate change" "scientists" who are too damn lazy to go out and EARN A LIVING IN THE PRIVATE SECTOR!

These "scientists" need to get off the government dole and GO GET A JOB!

"Liberalism is just Communism sold by the drink." P.J.O'Rourke

[Karmen Paulus]

It is a good thing since we need more fresh water to drink. By the way, where is the story about the projections that Europe will experience their coldest winter in one thousand years?

[Mikey]

Yes they have all of 12 years of data. And they changed the way this data was collected. Dont forget to deleat the email guys.

[Gary]

Vote YES on 23....global climate has NOTHING to do with what man does...climate change has ALWAYS been natures way of regenerating...this has nothing to do with what we do...so Gary, I'm voting YES and I'm hoping you lose your job.

[Kroakus]

All a little too late, we gone beyond the tipping point!

[Kroakus]

All yes just let it go man! We need to perish! Evil is man and man must go. Behold the Mayan's waterworld will soon be upon us!!

[Gary Nelson]

Another good reason to vote no on the pollutig industry's attempt to prevent green energy...Another good reason to vote NO on 23!

[Ron Winton]

Too bad so sad, How will the uneducated climate change deniers try and disprove these facts ? Well lets see.... I know the satellites must be mis-calibrated or the UC Irvine researchers must be on the take. Give it up uneducated deniers, you lost this debate a decade ago and the scientific facts are still mounting against you.

[Gary Nelson]

Another good reason to vote NO on 23!

[anon]

All the increasing fresh river water is going to give the temperate zones a drought! Mark my prophetic words!