California’s precipitation paradox

California has two seemingly contradictory and potentially devastating problems:

We have more water than we know what to do with — and more is on the way. We still don’t have nearly enough. More atmospheric rivers are due to wash over us this weekend. These are the same kind of statespanning bands of wet air responsible for dropping 32 trillion gallons of water on the state in January.

But in a bit of irony that Alanis Morissette might appreciate, the coming rain could actually complicate things in drought-plagued California by melting its snowpack too early.

This latest plume is now forecast to hit the northern and central regions of the state late Thursday. And unlike some prior storms, this one — a subtropical “Pineapple Express” — is expected to be fairly warm.

That’s good news for those of us still recovering from our astronomically higher January natural gas bills, sent skyward in part by the unusually cold weather.

But it could be bad news for those counting on California’s nearly unprecedented Sierra snowpack — or for those living downstream.

National Weather Service meteorologist Carlos

Molina: “We’re going to see rain on top of snow…we’re going to basically lose a lot of the snow that fell from the previous storms. We’re looking at potential for flooding.” There could be even more rain in California’s long-term forecast. New estimates from the World Meteorological Organization put good odds on the Pacific Ocean breaking from its three-year La Niña pattern and ushering the return of El Niño. In California, that generally means more rain and accompanying landslides, floods and coastal erosion.

Shored up? If coastal erosion in the face of rising seas is a public policy concern, you wouldn’t know it from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s draft budget. As Calmatters’ environment reporter Julie Cart explains, the governor proposes to cut funding for coastal resilience projects by 43% in the face of a more-than-$20 billion deficit.