{"id":252,"date":"2012-12-18T10:39:04","date_gmt":"2012-12-18T15:39:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/12\/2012-drought-more-expensive-than-hurricane-sandy.html"},"modified":"2012-12-18T10:39:04","modified_gmt":"2012-12-18T15:39:04","slug":"2012-drought-more-expensive-than-hurricane-sandy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2012\/12\/2012-drought-more-expensive-than-hurricane-sandy.html","title":{"rendered":"2012 Drought more expensive than Hurricane Sandy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n
\n<\/a>
\nYou thought Hurricane Sandy was bad?
\nYou were right, but economically, the ongoing drought is worse economically.
\nBut we already know a much brighter path.\n<\/p>\n

\nWeather Underground founder Dr. Jeff Masters wrote 16 November 2012,
\n
\nLessons from 2012: Droughts, not Hurricanes, are the Greater Danger<\/a>,\n<\/p>\n

\n

\nSandy’s damages of perhaps $50 billion will likely be overshadowed
\nby the huge costs of the great drought of 2012.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\nBy Dr. Masters’ estimate, the 2012 drought will cost more than half again
\nas much as Hurricane Sandy.\n<\/p>\n

\nAlso notice Hurricane Katrina still at the top of that table, with almost
\nthree times the economic damage and far more deaths than Hurricane Sandy.
\nWe could have gotten the message back in 2005, but hey, those were only
\npoor southern people, so who, in for example New York City, really cared?
\nYes, I know many of us did and many of you actively helped, but I’m
\nsure you see my point that when greater New York gets the storm,
\nsuddenly the country pays attention and a lot more people want to find
\nout how to keep that from happening again.\n<\/p>\n

\nWhat’s that drought look like for us here in Georgia at the moment,
\naccording to
\n
\nU.S. Drought Monitor?<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n
\n\"Georgia<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\nRight now we’re “only” abnormally dry in Lowndes County,
\nand elsewhere in Georgia it’s much worse.\n<\/p>\n

\nSo what’s the
\n
\ndrought forecast<\/a> from NOAA?\n<\/p>\n

\n
\n\"U.S.<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

\nIt looks like the drought will get worse.\n<\/p>\n

\nDr. Masters mentions the ancient Anasazi of the southwest whose civilization
\n
\n<\/a>
\ncollapsed during the Great Drought starting in the 12th century,
\nas well as numerous other civilizations that have not survived
\nprotracted drought.
\nAnd the Mayans.
\nEver wonder why the ancient Mayan civilization isn’t around to explain to us
\nthey meant their calendar that seems to come to an end this year was really
\nsupposed to repeat?
\nBecause
\n
\ntheir civilization didn’t survive a drought<\/a>,
\nand their scattered descendants forgot.\n<\/p>\n

\nDr. Masters then spells out the stakes we face now:\n<\/p>\n

\n

\nWe should not assume that the 21st century global civilization is
\nimmune from collapse due to drought. If we continue on our current
\npath of ever-increasing emissions of carbon dioxide, the hotter
\nplanet that we will create will surely spawn droughts far more
\nintense than any seen in recorded history, severely testing the
\nability of our highly interconnected global economy to cope. The
\ncoming great drought disasters will occur at a time when climate
\nchange is simultaneously creating record rainfall and flooding in
\nareas that happen to be in the way of storms.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n
\n<\/a>
\nHere in south Georgia and north Florida we are fortunate
\nthat our drinking water mostly comes from the deep
\nFloridan Aquifer,
\nso direct effects on people are buffered by that underground limestone lake.
\nNot that our aquifer
\nwill last forever as we increasingly suck up more water from it.\n<\/p>\n

\nMeanwhile, water for our crops and forests and
\n
\ncypress swamps<\/a>
\ndoes come from surface water, when we get any.
\nAnd sometimes we get way too much,
\nas in
\n
\nthe 700 year flood of 2009.<\/a>
\nPlus there are the likely
\n
\ncoastal floods of Savannah and Jacksonville<\/a> and everywhere in between.\n<\/p>\n

\nSo am I posting this just to say the end is nigh?
\nNo, because we know the way to a much better future, and all we need
\nto do is to get on with it.
\n
\nMoore’s Law is pushing ever-faster deployment of solar energy<\/a>,
\nwhich, combined with wind power, conservation, and energy efficiency,
\n
\n<\/a>
\ncan provide almost all of the power we need, so we can shut down
\nthe water-sucking nuclear, coal, and gas plants that are causing the problem.
\nOh, and we could stop cutting down quite so many trees and paving over
\nso many acres.
\nAnd the quicker we get on with it in Georgia, the quicker we’ll
\nall not just survive; the quicker we’ll all profit by switching
\nto renewable solar and wind energy.\n<\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/a>
\nThose really are the stakes: rapidly increasing droughts and floods
\nincreasingly damaging the local and world economy, or turning towards a sustainable path
\n
\nalready clearly visible
\nright in front of us<\/a> in the bright south Georgia sunshine.\n<\/p>\n

\n-jsq<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You thought Hurricane Sandy was bad? You were right, but economically, the ongoing drought is worse economically. But we already know a much brighter path. Weather Underground founder Dr. Jeff Masters wrote 16 November 2012, Lessons from 2012: Droughts, not Hurricanes, are the Greater Danger, Sandy’s damages of perhaps $50 billion will likely be overshadowed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,14,264,265,16,8,19,21,22,23,24,53,55,89,36],"tags":[1101,1103,8719,293,8704,8754,8755,8706,59,209,8701,8709,1099,560,8702,12,7,1098,8711,8712,302,8713,8714,215,1102,1104,8725,6,8727,8735,1100,8716],"class_list":["post-252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-climate-change","category-economy","category-energy-conservation","category-energy-efficiency","category-environment","category-georgia","category-history","category-planning","category-politics","category-renewable-energy","category-solar","category-sustainability","category-water","category-weather","category-wind","tag-anasazi","tag-civilization","tag-climate-change","tag-drought","tag-economy","tag-energy-conservation","tag-energy-efficiency","tag-environment","tag-flood","tag-floridan-aquifer","tag-georgia","tag-history","tag-hurricane-katrina","tag-hurricane-sandy","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-noaa","tag-planning","tag-politics","tag-rain","tag-renewable-energy","tag-solar","tag-south-georgia","tag-storm","tag-sunshine","tag-sustainability","tag-valdosta","tag-water","tag-weather","tag-weather-underground","tag-wind"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}