Experts Push For Water Conservation As Californians Face A Dry 2014
STUDIO CITY (CBSLA.com) — Experts are pushing for water conservation as Californians face another dry year.
CBS2's Adrianna Weingold reports that 2013 was the driest year on record for the Southland. Los Angeles got less than four inches of rain and the snowpack is at about 20 percent.
"When you look at the extremely dry conditions in Northern California and couple that with the drought conditions that have gone beyond 14 years on the Colorado River, we're certainly concerned in Southern California," Bob Muir of the Metropolitan Water District said.
CBS2/KCAL9 meteorologist Josh Rubenstein said the conditions this year are some of the worst he's ever seen.
"January and February should be the wettest months of the year and right now January is bone dry, and long range models show us bone dry all the way through the middle and end of the month," he said.
Rubenstein said the lack of rain right now is being caused by a high-pressure system sitting off the coast.
"This big ridge of high pressure is a blocking mechanism, it's a blocker, and it doesn't allow any of these storm systems to move into Southern California," he said.
Experts said the only thing saving SoCal is conservation—reserves big enough to hopefully hold the region through 2014 without mandatory water rationing.
"We're entering the year with about a year's worth of water on reserve for Southern California, so that is putting us in a much better position than many parts of the state," Muir said.
Until there's a change in the weather, Muir said everyone needs to be water-wise and conserve as much as possible in case the dry spell continues into 2015.
