Mike Dettinger
@mdettinger.bsky.social
8.3K followers 780 following 930 posts
Water/climate news & my own calculations when relevant, from CarsonCity (Wá∙šiw land), NV. Retired USGS & now p/t @CW3E/Scripps scientist Credentials: PhD.UCLA F.AGU F.AAAS M.NAE; www.mdettinger.com
Posts Media Videos Starter Packs
Reposted by Mike Dettinger
jameeljaffer.bsky.social
MIT's response to the Trump admin's proposed "compact" is excellent and should be a model for other universities. orgchart.mit.edu/letters/rega...
Reposted by Mike Dettinger
normcharlatan.bsky.social
This is what every Democratic state needs to do, tell its state university leaders that they will lose all state appropriations if they sign the compact. Take the decision out of feckless college administrators’ hands.
mkirschenbaum.bsky.social
Virginia State Senate Dems just brought down fire and fury regarding the “Compact,” notifying the President and Rector that UVA would lose ALL STATE APPROPRIATIONS if it signs and cedes the University to “federal political control.” Notably, their letter directly restates points made here by @siva.
sivav.bsky.social
The “compact” for higher ed is an unserious document written by unserious people from a position of spectacular ignorance. No one should take it seriously. Sadly, my bosses are taking it seriously.

newrepublic.com/article/2013...
Reposted by Mike Dettinger
conradhackett.bsky.social
International student arrivals to the US dropped 19% this year, the biggest drop on record aside from the 2020 pandemic low.
upshot.nytimes.com
The decline is occurring as the Trump administration has delayed visa processing, instituted travel bans or restrictions for 19 countries, threatened to deport international students for pro-Palestinian speech, and heightened the vetting of student visa applicants.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Nearly 20 Percent Fewer International Students Traveled to the U.S. in August
The data shows the steepest decline in August international student arrivals since the pandemic.
www.nytimes.com
mdettinger.bsky.social
New assessment identifies the flaws of five of the most-often discussed proposed polar-focused geo-climate engineering strategies. None seems likely to work & “most of them are more likely to be environmentally dangerous, causing more harm than they seek to solve.”

scripps.ucsd.edu/news/experts...
Experts Warn Against Five Polar Geoengineering Ideas
A team of international scientists is urging caution against five of the most-discussed polar geoengineering ideas, stating they are highly unlikely to help the polar regions and could harm ecosystems...
scripps.ucsd.edu
mdettinger.bsky.social
Great Basin Water Network & others put forth 9 urgent recommendations for improving the Colorado River water situation:

1) No New Dams and Diversions
2) All States Need Curtailment Plans
3) We Need Better Accounting and Data
4) We Need to Fix Glen Canyon’s Antique Plumbing
...

1/2
mdettinger.bsky.social
For 12 hrs no one could get a hold of this Nobel Laureate in Medicine to tell him the good news (and to begin all the pestering that will be his life now), because he was out in nature and off the grid w his wife. The karma must be v strong w this man!

www.thetimes.com/uk/science/a...
Nobel winner had no idea: he was off-grid in the Rockies
Fred Ramsdell shares the medicine prize with Mary Brunkow and Shimon Sakaguchi for their work on the immune system
www.thetimes.com
mdettinger.bsky.social
American Airlines and Google said they cut contrails by 54% in recent trial w flight schedule adjustments based on AI analysis of satellite imaging & weather forecasts (ie, cheaply). Contrails cause short but intense climate warming effects, as demo’d after 9/11.

www.semafor.com/article/10/0...
Slashing aviation’s climate impact could be ‘cheap’
Air travel releases CO₂, and also produces contrails — the white clouds aircraft leave in their wake.
www.semafor.com
mdettinger.bsky.social
New Trump order (Oct 6) allows 211-mi industrial access road thru Gates of the Arctic National Park/Preserve (2nd-largest NPS protected area) for mining of copper, cobalt, & gold.

www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adve...
mdettinger.bsky.social
Nope, no Environmental Protection for us today. Entrance to EPA in DC locked up tight this hot Monday morning.
mdettinger.bsky.social
For an (ancient) larger scale context, back in 2008, it was noted that—after the Western mountain snowpacks—the sloppy snows in the NE could be expected to be next most vulnerable to warming. ->Map of historically how much of precip that fell would have been above freezing if 2C warming applied.
https://www.mdettinger.com/_files/ugd/3b5c57_b9f6902fc6c14f4da54542683abea1b5.pdf
mdettinger.bsky.social
Note in 9-panel panel...
+ One BIG-snow year (e.g., 2017, 2019 & 2023) can reverse long term storage declines, briefly.
+ Near-normal yrs 2016 & 2024 held their own but didnt undo prior declines; near-normal 2020 yielded rez loss.
+ Dry years (2018, 2021 & 2022) led to sig declines in rez storage.
Reposted by Mike Dettinger
nationalacademies.org
The 2025 National Academy of Engineering Annual Meeting begins this Sunday, October 5 — featuring new member inductions, lectures on how AI is reshaping engineering solutions and society, and much more.

Register to attend: https://ow.ly/kGaw50X4wVA
mdettinger.bsky.social
Just to cllose out the water year, here is my final wy2025 storage graphic for the Upper Colorado, along with the previous 9 yrs worth for context. @cw3escripps.bsky.social

Explanations at
cnap.ucsd.edu/water-storag...
mdettinger.bsky.social
“Riverine heat waves” occur more often than air heat waves in 65 to 76% of sites, nationally.

www.thecooldown.com/outdoors/riv...

California “cold water droughts” (~same thing) increasingly result from mix of climate & landscape/water mgmt impacts, w/dire effects.

www.ppic.org/blog/tacklin...
Experts raise concerns over frightening phenomenon in US rivers: 'The trend … is actually increasing faster'
An in-depth study of riverine heat waves identified how America's rivers are running hot.
www.thecooldown.com
mdettinger.bsky.social
Beaver reintroductions & beaver dam analogs are important options for reducing climate-change impacts on western water resources. Cool new study looks into mapping & widespread modeling to identify options & opportunities...in today's Eos.

eos.org/articles/wha...

www.nature.com/articles/s43...
What Makes Beaver Ponds Bigger? - Eos
For the first time, researchers are able to add hydrologic estimates to find where reintroducing beavers could best benefit a watershed and the humans who live within it.
eos.org
mdettinger.bsky.social
McKibben is the father of modern climate journalism, so Covering Climate Now is honoring him with its first-ever lifetime achievement award. His advocacy-journalism re: the overheating Earth represents the best—not some aberration—of what journalism can do.

www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
Newsrooms Can Learn From Bill McKibben's Climate Journalism
Some traditional journalists complain that McKibben is an advocate — the same criticism Woodward and Bernstein faced during Watergate.
www.rollingstone.com
mdettinger.bsky.social
Oh jeez! I forgot to call him out by name: The great Dr. Marty Ralph!