Fri 7 Dec 2007

...And Then The Rains Came

I returned on Wednesday from a trip to the US (more about that in some future posts) and, since I've been back, the weather has been nothing but rain. Interspersed with the occasional thunderstorm. This, combined with a short report on last night's news saying that water catchment levels are at a recent high prompted me to go and look at the recent data. Thus, a quick update for my overseas climate enthusiast readers.

I've noted previously that the effects of long-term diminished rainfall and water restrictions are noticeable around even my relatively urban area, once I opened my eyes and started looking. Drought in "the country" is one thing, but what brings it home is when us city dwellers have to conserve water because we are literally running out of it. Earlier this year, the Sydney Catchment Authority (a.k.a people in charge of the big dams) were saying we had about 4.5 years of water left if rainfall stayed as it was. That was a little scary at the time.

Fortunately, things have definitely improved. The latest weekly report from the Catchmtent Authority shows that we have remained above 55% capacity for a couple months now and it is even ticking up slightly of late. The next mark of interest is 70%, which is considered fairly comfortable levels (100% being both obviously better and achievable — we were at 100% capacity back in 1998) for the future of the city's supply.

For the curious, I also stumbled across this page which gives a highly schematic map of where Sydney draws its water from. You would need to spend some time with an atlas or online equivalent to put those catchment areas into geographical perspective, something I don't have enthusiasm to do at the moment.

Topics: science/weather/drought