The NASA statement said the current higher temperatures are largely sustained by increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, especially carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is emitted by various human activities, from coal-fired power plants to fossil-fueled vehicles to human breath.

Current levels of CO2 are way above the 350 parts per million level, at 390ppm. Scientists and climate experts have determined that 350ppm is the safest upper limit for CO2 in our atmosphere, but we are well above it and continuing to climb. With record temperatures in the last 11 years and climate disasters getting more drastic and expensive each year, the future is not looking too bright anymore.

via Reuters. Image from BigStockPhoto

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Climate change promises to have a very big impact on water supplies in the United States as well as around the world. A recent study commissioned by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), a leading environmental group, and carried out by the consulting firm Tetra Tech found that one out of three counties across the contiguous U.S. should brace for water shortages by mid-century as a result of human induced climate change. The group found that 400 of these 1,100 or so counties will face “extremely high risks of water shortages.”

According to Tetra Tech’s analysis, parts of Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas will be hardest hit by warming-related water shortages. The agriculturally focused Great Plains and arid Southwest are at highest risk of increasing water demand outstripping fast dwindling supplies.

While the mechanisms behind this predicted dwindling of water supplies is complex, key factors include: rising sea levels and encroaching ocean water absorbing lower elevation freshwater sources; rising surface temperatures causing faster evaporation of existing reservoirs; and increasing wildfires stripping terrestrial landscapes of their ability to retain water in soils.

Researchers have already begun to notice dwindling water supplies across the American West in recent years, given less accumulation of snow in the region’s mountains as temperatures rise. According to a 2008 study out of the Scripps Institute for Oceanography and published in the journal Science, Western snowpack has been melting earlier than it did in the past thanks to global warming, leading to markedly longer dry periods through the late spring and summer months in states already suffering from extended droughts. Given that the length and strength of these changes over the last 50 years cannot be explained by natural variations, researchers believe human induced climate change is the culprit.

The upshot of these changes is that Americans of every stripe need to curtail their water usage—from farmers irrigating their crops to homeowners watering their lawns to you and I taking shorter showers and turning off the tap while brushing our teeth. Even more important, water and resource policy managers need to conceive of new paradigms for the management of freshwater reserves to make the most of what we do have. And all of us need to work together to cut down on the emissions of greenhouse gases that have led to global warming in the first place.

Analysts also worry that warming-related water shortages could erupt into conflict, especially in parts of the world where one country or group controls water resources needed by others across national borders, such as the Middle East where already five percent of the world’s population relies on just one percent of the world’s fresh water. Parts of Africa, India and Asia are also at risk for water-related conflicts. American policymakers hope that the situation won’t get that dire in the U.S., but only time will tell.

CONTACTS: NRDC; Tetra Tech; Scripps Institute for Oceanography.

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While an ice age may seem like an event only portrayed in history books and Hollywood movies, the fact is that they normally happen every 10,000 to 15,000 years and if we were still on schedule we would be due for another within the next 1,000 – 1,500 years. However, due to the high levels of CO2 in our atmosphere and the climate change that goes along with such conditions, the next ice age has been put off to at least 1,500 years from now, if not much longer:

No glacial inception is projected to occur at the current atmospheric CO2 concentrations of 390 ppmv (parts per million by volume). Indeed, model experiments suggest that in the current orbital configuration—which is characterized by a weak minimum in summer insolation—glacial inception would require CO2 concentrations below preindustrial levels of 280 ppmv. Assuming that ice growth mainly responds to insolation and CO2 forcing, this analogy suggests that the end of the current interglacial would occur within the next 1500 years, if atmospheric CO2 concentrations did not exceed 240?ppmv.

The problem with that is that we are already way over a CO2 concentration of 240 ppmv. If we were still at pre-industrial levels, we may be looking at an ice age within 1,500 years. But because we are well over 240 ppmv already, and are actually hovering around 400 ppmv, the study portrays the ice age as being put off for a little while.

Of course, I think we’ll have much bigger issues than an ice age at the rate we are destroying the environment. I know I wouldn’t want to be living here in 1,000 years or so, even if humans were still in existence. Think rising sea levels, worldwide food shortages, virulent diseases, intense heat waves, and more violent “natural” disasters. An ice age in the distant future is the least of our problems.

Image from BigStockPhoto

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There are a couple of things that happen to affect animal habitats during a climate shift. One is that there are extended periods of drought. Another is that water levels (of the oceans, at least) rise. These two major changes in habitat can have an extremely detrimental effect on wildlife populations in a number of ways. The first is that the environment that animals are used to living in may no longer support them, so that they have to migrate to other areas in search of food, water, and a place to raise their young. Many species that have been in a particular locale for centuries could find themselves virtually homeless.

But where will they go? On a planet teeming with human habitation (and lands devoted to wildlife already shrinking) they may find themselves forced to move into populated areas in search of the necessary elements of survival. And humans are not likely to suffer wild animals rooting through their trash, eating their vegetable gardens, or using their domesticated animals as an all-you-can-eat buffet.

The other option is that they continue trying to live in their original habitat, which often results in disaster. Just look at the polar bears. With their hunting and breeding grounds shrinking thanks to melting polar ice caps and salmon populations dwindling due to a lack of cold water needed for reproduction, polar bears are having to travel farther and farther in search of food, many aren’t breeding (how can they support offspring when they can’t even feed themselves?), and in some cases, they are simply dying off.

And they’re not alone. Instances like this are being seen all over the globe with wildlife leaving natural habitats in search of food, water, shelter, and breeding grounds. And yet, humans just keep on spewing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and adding to the problem. If there was any kind of environmental justice, we’d poison ourselves first and give the rest of the planet a fighting chance. But at the moment it seems like wild animal populations are suffering the most. However, humans are still part of the food chain. And if we don’t start making changes soon, it won’t be long before the plants and animals are gone and we’re left with the ill-effects of our poor decisions.

Evan Fischer is a conservation writer who works with NRDC and other environmental justice organizations to protect our health and environment.

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