This editorial appeared in The Sacramento Bee.
The latest report from California's Climate Action Team contains some sobering conclusions from a broad collection of new research on global warming's likely effect on the state.
Dozens of studies completed in the past two years have projected the effects of climate change on California's snowpack and water supply, sea level, agriculture, forestry, air quality and electricity use.
The results suggest that quite apart from the state's controversial attempt to slow or reverse global warming, Californians and their government almost certainly will have to adapt to changing conditions by changing the way they farm, protect the coast and deal with a more fickle water supply. If the current temperature trends persist, these changes will be necessary whether the warming is caused by man, as most climate scientists now believe, or simply represents a broad and inevitable turn of the meteorological cycle.
Starting from a foundation of international research on average temperature increases and likely scenarios for the 21st century, the new research reports look in fine detail at how life in California would change under those projections.
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