Tree rings reveal a history of decades-long droughts in the west
- May 7, 2014
By Justin Beach
Staff Writer, Daily Digest News
A recent study of tree rings in Utah indicates that the “Dust Bowl” of the 1930s would barely crack the top 10 list of the worst droughts in the state’s history. This adds to a growing body of evidence that the states in the western US are prone to droughts that can last for decades or even centuries.
Bringham Young University professor Matthew Bekker analyzed tree rings using sand paper and microscopes in an effort to determine the moisture available to trees dating back to 1429. What beaker found was a series of multi year droughts and a history of droughts following one on top of another.
For example, the year a dry period that began in 1703 lasted for 16 years. In 1580 the Webber River, which supplies a significant amount of Utah’s water and feeds the Great Salt Lake, flowed at just 13 percent. During three other periods it has dropped below 20 percent. Bekker also found that during the lifetime of Christopher Columbus (1452-1506) the region experienced four of the worst five droughts on record.
“We’re conservatively estimating the severity of these droughts that hit before the modern record, and we still see some that are kind of scary if they were to happen again. We would really have to change the way we do things here,” said Bekker in a statement.
The research, which involved analysis of living and dead trees in the Weber River basin, gives scientists a record which extends back 585 years. The work was published in the Journal of the American Water Resources Association.
While this is the first research of its kind in Utah, the report follows on the heels of several others indicated extended droughts in the region. Several recent studies point to megadroughts in Wyoming and Colorado which lasted for several decades or even centuries. Additional research shows similar megadroughts in California and the Southwest.
“We continue to run California as if the longest drought we are ever going to encounter is about seven years. We’re living in a dream world,” said Scott Stine, a professor of geography and environmental studies at Cal State East Bay to MSN.com.
However, since this is 2014 and not the 19th century technology may be of some help. The recent drought has sparked a renewed interest in the state in desalination plants, which remove salt from sea water. It is an option that has provided water for normally arid areas of the middle east.
Desalination, while feasible, does come at a considerable cost. A recent report by NPR news states that work has begun in Carlsbad, California on the largest desalination plant in the Western Hemisphere. The plant carries a construction price tag of $1 billion and when complete will supply fresh water to 112 thousand households.
The total population of California however is more than 38 million, which could easily push the cost of supplying the state with reclaimed sea water into the hundreds of billions of dollars. It is also important to note that the Carlsbad plant is meant to provide household water and says nothing about the cost of water for agriculture or industry.
Such solutions also do not help the residents and industries of states like Utah, Nevada, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico. For residents of these states to get water from the sea it would have to be delivered overland by pipeline, adding considerably to the cost.
In 2008, Dow chief executive Andrew Liveris declared that “water is the oil of the 21st century”. It would appear that, at least as far as the western US is concerned, Liveris was absolutely right and while alternatives to fossil fuel are becoming better and more numerous all the time, there is no alternative to water.