If you’ve got time (about an hour and 20 minutes), please listen to this conversation between 2 radio hosts and Prof. Peter Kolb of the U. of Montana’s Dept. of Forest Management about the recent and deadly fires in California (below at the bottom). Prof. Kolb was a native Californian with family still living in the state. The “burning” question for most everyone concerns the extent California state policies have contributed to the danger of destructive wildland fires in the state. The quick and short answer shouldn’t be a quick and short answer. Yet, the prevailing climate of governing opinion in the state can’t be ignored, a view that leans in the direction of environmental preservation at nearly all costs. It is a factor bunched together with California’s unique conditions.
Here are some often-mentioned points to ponder:
(1) Climate change: Yes, we’re in a warming trend, but long term climate changes can’t be adjusted like your wall thermostat. Besides, unless you’re able to convince 2 billion Chinese and Indians to stop they’re economic growth, global mitigations are highly unlikely. Greenie energy like wind and solar aren’t a substitute for fossil fuels in propelling a poor country into prosperity. Period.
(2) Drought: It’s a fact of life regardless of warming trends, and it’s only exacerbated by the state’s hot dry-summer climate. This raises the concerns about the state’s measures, if any, to alleviate the annually recurring dry spells. Do they intensify or lessen the fire danger? There’s reason to doubt the efficacy of many of the policies that might exist.
(3) Foliage: California has biomes uniquely suited to its annual and extensive dry periods such as chaparral on the coasts and foothills . These are plants that can survive the dry periods alongside the dry grasses and dead forest litter. If the under-story of “fine fuels” ignites, a fire will race through with mounting intensity.
(4) El Diablo, the Santa Anas: These eastern hot and dry winds are a natural feature of California’s climate. They exist regardless of climate change. Since they are as persistent as the coastal surf, what has the state done to deal with their inevitable consequences? My guess: nothing much.
(5) Development practices in WUI (Wild-Urban-Interface): This refers to the aesthetic preference of many residents in the state for trees and brush against building walls in that uneven zone between wildlands and structures. It’s a disaster-in-waiting in times of hot, dry, and windy conditions in California’s dry-summer biomes.
(6) California’s policies: It’s a state in the grip of environmentalism. The “ism” is a single-minded preference for a form of nature preservation without humans. Wildland management policies reflect this bias. Fuel builds up in the hinterlands due to restrictions on measures to reduce the fuel load. Such as, the state requires a “forest management plan” to remove dead trees and brush on a person’s property. Of course, the rule and regulations about it are enforced by an elaborate bureaucracy. Be prepared to spend $5,000-$10,000.
(7) California’s decaying infrastructure: The state’s water storage and delivery systems are now approaching 5 decades or older and were built for a population half the size. In like manner, decades of greenie mandates and regulations are corrupting the state’s grid. Rising electricity demands on an aging grid can contribute to mishaps like the one just outside of Paradise, Ca. California’s answer is to raise taxes on an already over-taxed population, all the while undermining the physical grid by forcing the utilities to subsidize greenie visions of utopia at the expense of maintenance. And of course, the governing classes will answer with a call to raise rates.
(Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)
In the end, California has the worst roads, a dilapidated water system, an energy grid that is environmentally snazzy but aging into incontinence, and the all-too-familiar recurrence of fires capable of reproducing Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Just saying.
Please watch the video (see below).
RogerG
The video link:
https://www.facebook.com/newstalkkgvo/videos/369303803803244/?t=2