Climate change through the lens of increasing hydroclimate whiplash

The past decade has brought episodes of exceptional and even historically unprecedented warmth, both in California and around the world. But perhaps even more disruptive than rising global average temperatures and record-breaking regional heatwaves have been the pronounced dry and wet extremes experienced over the same period--and especially the severe droughts, floods, and wildfires that have accompanied them. In this talk, I will discuss the emerging paradigm of increasing "hydroclimate whiplash" on a warming planet, reflecting on both the underlying science and the broader societal and ecological implications of increasingly wide swings between wet and dry extremes.

»Daniel Swain, California Institute for Water Resources

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