The Burning Time
The Burning Time
As I write the sky outside is an eerie brown-gray. Although it’s around noontime, the sun is barely visible through the shroud of smoke hanging above. A light rain of ash falls steadily. Southern California in general and San Diego County in particular are at the center of a firestorm. Here in San Diego County between 500,000 and 1,000,000 people have been evacuated from their homes.
I’ve lived in Southern California since arriving here at age 12. That was thirty-eight years ago, back in 1969. So I know that autumn in Southern California is often a time of firestorms driven by Santa Ana winds. That is not unusual. However the intensity of these firestorms and in particular the number of separate fires burning at once has increased. So has the destructiveness of these fires, measured in terms of property damage.
How to account for this? I believe that three related factors are combining to produce this dire result:
1) Suburban sprawl is out of control across Southern California. San Diego County is no exception.i Further, these houses are not fire-resistant.
2) An overall, long-term effect of global warming upon Southern California’s climate is to produce longer, hotter, and drier summers. ii
3) Human-caused global warming is increasing the heat content of the oceans. Temperatures have risen by over a half degree Fahrenheit on average across the world’s oceans already. iii This temperature rise is increasing the frequency of the Pacific Ocean phenomenon called El Niño.iv v According to climate researchers, El Niño acts as a safety valve for excess heat buildup in the tropics that normal oceanic currents and weather cannot dissipate.vi viiThe effect of this is to shift winter rainfall across the Pacific to the West Coast of the United States.viii California, and especially Southern California, experiences wetter than normal winters when El Niño occurs.
Combining these three variables explains what is happening in Southern California as I type these words:
El Niño conditions in 2004-5 in Southern California produced record winter rainfall.ix
This led to an exuberant growth of foliage across the region. This excess of vegetation subsequently died off and was desiccated by two long, hot summers in 2006 and 2007. These summers were separated by a record low rain season in 2006-7.x
The vegetation was converted to explosively dry kindling which awaited the arrival of seasonal Santa Ana winds to begin to blow fast, hot and dry from east to west across Southern California.
Once these winds arrived on 21 October, 2007, a firestorm which would engulf the ever-sprawling suburbs of Southern California including San Diego County was inevitable. And now the conflagrations rage.
Everything was wholly predictable. Yet nothing was done to avert it. This is because taking effective action would require that we fundamentally change the way that our political economy is organized.
To abate the frequency of future El Niños along with the trend towards ever longer, drier, and hotter summers, we must reduce the profligate burning of coal, oil and natural gas. Developing non-polluting alternative sources of energy, using less energy, and just generally wanting less stuff are all urgently needed. As to suburban sprawl, planning, smart growth and “New Urbanism” (a return to well designed walkable cities in which people actually live and work) are alternatives.
Although this urban planning could be very profitable, our housing industry will of course oppose this because it may reduce their short-term profits and because it requires them to give some actual thought to their housing development designs. Such things are inherently “bad for business” according to the rulers of our economic and political system.
And so, here in Southern California on this gloomy afternoon, the ashes of thousands of burning homes fall upon us. Will we ever learn?
i http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=research_researchb341_sup
ii http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/06/020604073114.htm
iii http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2005/change.shtml
iv http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/05/el-nino-global-warming/
v http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/tao/elnino/faq.html
vi http://www.pbs.org/wnet/savageseas/weather-side-elnino.html
vii http://www.ucar.edu/communications/quarterly/winter97/connection.html
viii http://ggweather.com/enso/calenso.htm
ix http://www.usatoday.com/weather/stormcenter/2005-02-22-Calif-storms_x.htm?POE=NEWISVA
x http://www.ksby.com/Global/story.asp?S=6861146
Hi Mike,
I have been thinking of you and your geographic exposure as these fires have intensified. Actually, since reading your book I've wondered what in the hell would keep you living in So. Cal. where so many of the coming consequences will be magnified.
Anyway, what interests me is the notion that we can mitigate the coming environmental challenges. With the Asian world hell bent for imitating our lifestyle added to what's already in the pipeline, I think we have the proverbial snowball's chance.
That said, I understand the need to give people the notion that they have some control over their fate. However, it is just this notion that we are in charge that has led us to this point. It seems to me that we are playing out a classic study where a species bereft of predators and with a seeming abundance of resourses has over consumed and overpopulated to the point of poisoning and depleting their environment. Ie. they have shit on their plate.
We are just smart enough to notice what we have done in retrospect.
I've always look forward to your posts. Thank you for your insight and stay safe.
Tom Wienstroer new email: wanderdharma@aol.net
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Many thanks for the kind thoughts Tom!
I'm here mainly because of the connections I've made locally in past years during my Congressional campaign, teaching, and other efforts.
But, yes, as the current firestorms make clear the times of comfort and stability we've known all of our lives are fast disappearing. In fact, they are dissappearing fastest right here.
As always, I appreciate your comments!
Mike Byron
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Mike,
In fall of 1970 when I was in navy boot camp one of these conflagrations swept through the San Diego area. The sun was a dull orange orb at noon and ashes lay two inches deep in the streets.
Nothing was learned then; the vegetation grew back, the suburbs grew out, and the next disaster was inevitable.
I have two comments to make on urban/wildland interface fires:
First, they only have enough fuel available to happen because the houses there are heated with fossil fuels, brought in by wires (electricity) pipes (natural gas) or trucks (propane). When fossil fuels get too scarce and expensive, if anyone is still living in those suburbs they will be scrounging every last stick of wood from the surrounding hillsides just to stay warm. The problem will shift from wildfire due to excess fuel load to erosion and landslides due to not enough vegetation.
Second: All wildland firefighting as we know it is 100% petroleum-dependent. The bulldozers, water tank trucks, fire retardent-dropping aircraft -- even the hot shot crews cutting fire line with hand tools arrived in passenger vans, sometimes from several states away. With the arrival of Peak Oil we had better start thinking about the future of firefighting in all fire-prone landscapes.
Ironically, the only answer will prove to be a vastly expanded prescribed burn program, much like the Native Americans before us who kept their lands burned off at just the right intervals and times of year to maximize the benefit to the vegetation, wildlife, and themselves. We cannot log our way out of this; that just makes the problem worse. We cannot clear the excess fuel load by hand; no one has the money for that much labor. Controlled burns under just the right timing are the only answer.
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Mike, Another issue that the fires have brought into San Diego and Los Angeles Counties are poisons, toxins and chemicals from the homes that burned. I have identified the following chemicals and toxins on the ash: nickel, arsenic, cadmium, and aluminum. The rains have since cleaned the streets but people are unaware that the residues are in the house dust and come back in every time there is a Santa Ana wind. I recommend cleaning well with a damp cloth and vacuuming often. As a health practitioner, I also recommend a natural supplement NAC (N-Acetyl-Cysteine) for anti-oxidant protection for your lungs and other organs. I have had to retreat to the high desert in order to clean these toxins out of my system because I douldn't handle the exposure. When I return to SD next week (March) I will be starting a major cleaning of my apartment. Please be aware of the probability that your health is being affected. Many of my clients are experiencing fatigue, brain fog and acid conditions like heartburn and have not realized they were breathing in chemicals from the ash. Hope this helps raise some awareness. Judith
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