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Climate Scientists' Dire Vision; Intense Droughts, Floods Seen for U.S., Canada

Posted on: Tuesday, 17 April 2007, 15:00 CDT

WASHINGTON Climate scientists released a grim portrait Monday of the likely effects of global warming on the United States and Canada.

More droughts, floods, heat waves, infectious diseases and extinctions are possible for two of the most prosperous countries on the planet, according to the North American section of the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Poor countries in tropical Africa and Asia will be hit even harder by the effects of higher temperatures and rising sea levels.

In the U.S., the Southwest, California, Alaska, and the Atlantic and Gulf coasts are the most seriously threatened, the authors of the new report said at a Washington news conference.

"The impacts are faster and larger than we ever anticipated," said Anthony Janetos, a climate researcher at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. "Things are happening much more quickly than the science community imagined. It's profoundly concerning."

Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation, an environmental action group, said, "It's not just global warming, it's local warming. It's happening where we live."

Also on Monday, 11 retired U.S. generals and admirals said worldwide water shortages caused by global warming are a "serious threat to America's national security" and might drag the U.S. into fights over shortages of natural resources.

The North American section of the report predicts that:

* By 2039, average temperatures across North America will rise by 1.8 to 5.4 degrees F.

* Less rain will fall in the Southwest, but more will fall in the rest of the continent. The chances of extreme precipitation and flooding will increase.

* There will be more intense mid-latitude storms and extreme wave heights.

* Shrinking Western mountain snowpacks will melt earlier, causing spring floods and drier summers. Southwestern states will battle for water.

* Water levels in the Great Lakes will drop, affecting ship navigation and fishing, and exposing buried pollutants.

* Sea levels will rise 9 to 18 inches by 2100 along U.S. coasts, higher in Canada and Alaska. Up to 21 percent of coastal wetlands in the mid-Atlantic region will be lost. Higher seas and accompanying storm surges will harm transportation along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts.

Source: Record, The; Bergen County, N.J.

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