The Massashusetts Climate Change Adaptation Report is now available here. This report was mandated as part of the 2008 Global Warming Solutions Act. You may be forgiven if you missed its mention in the Boston Globe as I did. It was featured prominently in a single column on page B15 on Wednesday, below the weather report. Not that this stuff is very important:
Massachusetts is set to experience a 3° to 5°C (5° to 10°F) increase in average ambient temperature, with several more days of extreme heat during the summer months. Days with temperatures greater than 32°C (90°F) are predicted to increase from the 5 to 20 days annually that Massachusetts experiences today to between 30 to 60 days annually; while up to 28 days annually are predicted to reach above 38°C (100°F), compared to up to two days annually today (Frumhoff et al., 2006, 2007). Sea surface temperatures are also predicted to increase by 4°C (8°F) (Dutil and Brander, 2003; Frumhoff et al., 2007; Nixon et al., 2004), while winter precipitation—mostly in the form of rain—is expected to increase by 12 to 30 percent. The number of snow events is predicted to decrease from five each month to one to three each month (Hayhoe et al., 2006).
I’ve only gotten through the executive summary so far and it is about 120 pages, but I thought someone should bring it to everyone’s attention.
