California drought compounds climate change concerns: ‘We cannot afford to wait any longer’

California has entered its second drought in the 21st century and it is just as serious as it sounds.

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California’s recent drought is considered to be its worst in 1,200 years according to the New York Times. With a reported 23% decrease in the snow pack, it is safe to say California is in for a pretty nasty wildfire season.

Andrew Schwartz, a scientist at UC Berkeley’s Central Sierra Snow Lab, shares more.

ANDREW SCHWARTZ: The drought that we have here in California is a multiple year drought, of course, and it’s one of the most severe that we’ve seen in the last 1,200 years. Right now , our snowpack still exists on the ground, but it’s melting about a month earlier than it even did last year.

As you may have guessed, climate change has a thing or two to do with this. Jeanine Jones work at the California Department of Water Resources focuses on this very issue.

JEANINE JONES: Well, this drought is now the second drought in the current century in which we are definitely seeing impacts of climate change. California has a long history with drought. It’s a normal part of our climate system. But in our prior drought of 2012 to 2016 and in this current drought, which began in 2020, we have definitely been seeing an overlay of intensified impacts due to climate change.

According to James Nachbaur, a member of California’s Environmental Protection Agency, we’re experiencing these effects in real time.

JAMES NACHBAUR: There is awareness now that climate change is making droughts in California potentially more severe and potentially longer lasting. Climate change is also making the weather a little more variable, so we can move from a relatively wet month like last December to a very dry period like January and February of this year.

The solution to the drought and climate change are not easy to identify nor achieve. Jones stresses that this time, its going to require policy-makers to step up.

JONES: It’s much bigger than just the average citizen. And you know, the the thing about some of these response actions is that they take a long time to put in place. They may be politically difficult, and certainly many of them are expensive.

While changes in legislation await, experts advise that households should be more conscious about their water consumption.

Correction (Apr. 7): A previous version of this article mistakenly attributed the piece’s last quote to Nachbaur instead of Jones.