Over the last year or two, the ubiquitous two-word phrase ‘climate change’ has, with increasing frequency, been replaced with the phrase ‘climate emergency’. Spring has not quite yet transitioned to summer in California wine country, but there are plenty of alarm bells ringing that make it clear the state is firmly in the grip of the latter.
On Wednesday 21 April, California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a drought emergency for Sonoma and Mendocino Counties. As the site for his announcement he chose the dry bed of Lake Mendocino where, he said, under normal circumstances he should have been standing ‘40 feet underwater’. Last Monday, 10 May, he expanded that emergency declaration to add 39 other counties to the list, including Napa.
Rainfall in the state is at 42% of normal levels according the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration with parts of Sonoma County at just 33% of historical averages. At a time when parts of the state would normally be seeing the last of their spring showers, more than 1,788 fires have already started, including some flare-ups from ‘holdover fires’ – smouldering embers from 2020 that did not receive enough rain to be fully extinguished over the winter. The wildfire risk for much of the west, as shown above in a map from Channel 7 News, is already extreme.
Continue reading this story on JancisRobinson.Com.
This article is my monthly column at JancisRobinson.Com, Alder on America, and is usually available only to subscribers of her website. If you’re not familiar with the site, I urge you to give it a try. It’s only £8.50 a month or £85 per year ($11/mo or $111 a year for you Americans) and well worth the cost, especially considering you basically get free, searchable access to the Oxford Companion to Wine ($65) and maps from the World Atlas of Wine ($50) as part of the subscription costs. Click here to sign up.
The Link LonkMay 17, 2021 at 11:30PM
https://www.vinography.com/2021/05/california-runs-dry
California Runs Dry - Vinography
https://news.google.com/search?q=dry&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
No comments:
Post a Comment