Global Warming In the News

Freaky, torrential downpours, like the one that inundated parts of North Jersey on Monday, are likely to become more common as the effects of climate change continue to worsen, a new report issued by the White House on Tuesday indicated.

More frequent rains and droughts, an accelerated rise in sea levels, increased flooding and warmer temperatures are already apparent in New Jersey and across the country because of climate changes that have largely been caused by human behavior, the report states.

The findings provide President Obama with further ammunition as he presses for legislation that would begin to address activities linked to climate change, such as the emission of greenhouse gases from vehicles and coal-burning power plants.

Two of the findings – that climate change is accelerating a rise in sea levels and that it will alter storm frequency and intensity in ways that could affect the drinking water supply by the mid- to late-century - are particularly relevant to New Jersey, scientists and environmentalists said Tuesday.

“This is not something that’s going to affect just polar bears,” said Doug O’Malley of Environmental New Jersey, an advocacy group. “It means sea level rise from Atlantic City to the Meadowlands. It means a much hotter New Jersey. We’re looking at a state that would be fundamentally different on every level.”

The report notes that since 1970, the Northeast has seen average temperatures rise 2 degrees — and double that in winter. “New Jersey is definitely on the upswing and we’ve seen more change in winter,” said Dave Robinson, the state climatologist at Rutgers University.

In the shorter term, though, Robinson is more worried about the potential for drought than a few extra days over 100 degrees. “The good news is that the Northeast is the one part of the country where they expect to see no decline in annual precipitation,” Robinson said. “The bad news is it will come in a streakier pattern with heavier rains and prolonged dry periods.”

New Jersey has become 5 percent wetter since 1970, and halfway through June the state has already received more rainfall than is typical for the entire month, Robinson said.

“One of the key findings for New Jersey, and particularly North Jersey, is the fact that climate change will stress water resources,” said Tony Broccoli, director of the Climate and Environmental Change Initiative at Rutgers. North Jersey relies more heavily for its drinking water on surface sources, such as rivers and reservoirs, than South Jersey, which taps into aquifers.

Climate change speeds up the water cycle, the process by which ocean water evaporates into clouds, then falls to earth as rain or snow, and then makes its way back to the oceans. As that cycle gets disrupted, it will affect the sources that North Jersey relies on for its drinking water, Broccoli said.

“Even if you get the same amount of rain in a year, but it comes in more intense bursts, that leads to severe flooding, which makes it harder for us to use that water efficiently,” Broccoli said.

Flooding also affects New Jersey’s transportation network. “A lot of our roads are in flood-prone areas, which will disrupt our daily lives,” Broccoli said. “With the severe storm that Bergen County experienced Monday, flooding is not far from our minds.”

The accelerating rise in sea levels also has a large effect on New Jersey, said Ken Miller, an expert on sea level change at Rutgers.

“One of the biggest differences from just two years ago is that the expected extent of sea level rise is much worse,” Miller said.

Globally, sea levels rose at a rate of 1.8 millimeters a year during most of the 20th century, then jumped to 3 millimeters a year since 1993.

For New Jersey, however, that rise has been greater because of natural geological forces. As ice sheets melt in Canada, the land surface there rises. And that shift forces New Jersey to sink, Miller said.

The findings mirrored a similar report released last year by the National Conference of State Legislatures, which predicted economic devastation along the Jersey Shore. It estimated that more than $106 billion in real estate in coastal counties will be at risk from rising sea levels and more frequent storms by 2100 if global warming continues along its present course.

While the new report by the United States Global Change Research Program doesn’t put a price tag on the damage, it said the changes could harm everything from fish populations to thousands of migratory birds who travel the shoreline each fall and spring.

In North Jersey, the Meadowlands — linked to the ocean by a network of bays, rivers, streams and wetlands — are particularly vulnerable, with residential and industrial developments and the state’s largest sports and entertainment complex abutting low-lying tidal marshes. The Meadowlands Commission already measures sea levels throughout the marshes of the 14-town district, which floods routinely during heavy storms.

Higher sea levels also create a greater storm surge from even moderate storms — making the level of flooding associated with a 100-year storm occur every five to 10 years from lesser storms, Miller said. Newark Airport will be under water during those peak floods, Miller said.

One Obama administration official, Jane Lubchenco, called the findings a game changer.

“This report provides the concrete scientific information that says unequivocally that climate change is happening now and it’s happening in our own backyards and it affects the kind of things people care about,” Lubchenco said at a White House briefing. Her agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was among the key contributors to the document, which is the culmination of work started during the Bush Administration.