Sunday, August 13, 2017

“The Farther Out You Get In Time, The More Uncertainty You Get In The Numbers" -- Water Level Expert -- August 13, 2017

Al Gore says he can predict the rise in sea level -- about 2 inches -- one hundred years from now.

Two articles regarding the level of Lake Mead:

First, from April 18, 2017, The Las Vegas Review-Journal: Lake Mead to get above-average flow of Colorado River water
The federal government plans to release an above-average amount of Colorado River water into Lake Mead this year, but it’s less than many hoped after a healthy snow season across much of the West.
The Bureau of Reclamation, which manages dams and reservoirs on the Colorado River, said Monday that it will release 9 million acre-feet (an acre-foot is enough water to cover 1 acre of land 1 foot deep) from Lake Powell, sending it down the Colorado to Lake Mead, where it will be tapped by Arizona, California and Nevada.
Last month, the agency projected it could release 11.1 million acre-feet from Lake Powell, but a dry early March reduced the amount of snow in the mountains that feed the river.
The planned release is above the annual average of 8.7 million acre-feet, and it should be enough to delay a widely expected shortage declaration in Lake Mead.
Now, just two months later, from June 16, 2017, The Las Vegas Review-Journal: Latest forecast shifts Lake Mead from big gain to small loss.
Several hundred billion gallons of water vanished from federal forecasts for Lake Mead over the past two months, but Bureau of Reclamation officials insist there’s no reason to panic.

In April, the bureau was predicting that the man-made lake east of Las Vegas would finish 2018 about 21 feet higher than it is today. Now the bureau is forecasting a 4-foot drop in the surface of the reservoir over the next 18 months — a difference of 25 feet.

But not to worry, said Rose Davis, spokeswoman for the Bureau of Reclamation in Boulder City. It’s too soon to say which scenario might turn out to be true.

“The farther out you get in time, the more uncertainty you get in the numbers,” Davis said. “They will get better, hopefully, if we get another good winter.”
Hmmm ... let's repeat that ...  “The farther out you get in time, the more uncertainty you get in the numbers.”

The experts greatly over-estimated Lake Mead water level in less than two months, but yet, these same experts know that the earth's sea level will rise two inches over the next 100 years. Okay. 

Lake Mead: sea level.

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