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"The wild card is what happens given the additional atmospheric water capacity in a warmer climate." The recent catastrophic floods in Europe add some data poi
by praptak 5y ago
"The wild card is what happens given the additional atmospheric water capacity in a warmer climate."
The recent catastrophic floods in Europe add some data points to the pessimistic side. The additional capacity materialised as torrential rains which cause flash floods but don't help that much with aquifers.
- corty 5y agoMaybe. Germany had a very rainy summer this year, and the flash floods were just single-day events in a long period of cloudy, rainy but noncatastrophic weather. The regular, noncatastrophic rain actually made up for most of the draught in the last three summers. So I would be hesitant to interpret this data either way.
- ChuckMcM 5y agoPrecisely correct. I got into a fascinating discussion with a Hydrologist from UC Davis who was studying water transport (the whole evaporate -> rain -> run off cycle) and their thesis was that mechanisms that entrap water (reservoirs) that are based on gradual rainfall over months, are not the ideal water catchment solution for water that comes sporadically in very large dumps. The Mayan's had an extensive network of cisterns[1] that captured water for later use when it wasn't raining heavily. Anyway, the practical upshot of that is that different infrastructures do better at capturing and releasing water and they have to be tuned to the water transport mechanism for optimum effect. Changes in the climate that change water transport are likely to invalidate existing infrastructure "design rules" and existing infrastructure built for a different water transport cycle will be less effective resulting in less net water delivery. Wild right? [1] https://www.nationalgeographic.org/media/technology-rainwater-survival-maya/print/ https://www.nationalgeographic.org/media/technology-rainwate...