LUBBOCK, Texas (DTN) -- As Texas Gov. Rick Perry argues the science of climate change is questionable, the state climatologist in Texas says the current historic drought that has caused an estimated $5.2 billion in agricultural losses is more intense as a consequence of climate change.

 

Perry weighed in on the issue in New Hampshire on Wednesday as he seeks the Republican presidential bid. Press reports quoted Perry saying, "I think we're seeing almost weekly, or even daily, scientists that are coming forward and questioning the original idea that manmade global warming is what is causing the climate to change," the Texas governor said on the first stop of a two-day trip to the first-in-the-nation primary state.

Perry added he did not want to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on the issue.

"I don't think from my perspective that I want to be engaged in spending that much money on still a scientific theory that has not been proven and from my perspective is more and more being put into question."

Yet, John Nielsen-Gammon disagrees. Nielsen-Gammon is the Texas state climatologist, and a professor in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University. In an interview last week with DTN/The Progressive Farmer, Nielsen-Gammon said the historic drought in Texas has intensified as a consequence of climate change because it has raised temperatures a degree or two on the Fahrenheit scale from what they would be otherwise.

"It's hotter and there is greater demand for water for livestock and forage, and there is also more evaporation in the lakes, so hence the demand and supply," Nielsen-Gammon said.

On Wednesday, Texas AgriLife Extension Service economists at Texas A&M said the drought has caused a record $5.2 billion in agricultural losses, eclipsing $4.1 billion in losses during the 2006 drought. Experts across the state have said this drought will have a lasting impact on the state's agriculture.

Nielsen-Gammon told DTN the magnitude of this drought is much bigger than 2006 and the lack of rainfall is more severe.

"It's a lot more widespread," he said. "The 2006 drought was mainly focused in central and south-central Texas where this one has affected the entire state. And it's affected it with less rainfall. I don't think anyplace in the state was drier in 2006 than they are at the moment in the current drought."

The impacts thus far include more than $2 billion in livestock losses, $1.8 billion in lost cotton value and $750 million in lost hay production. The rest of the losses are associated with corn, wheat and sorghum. Those losses don't factor in fruit, vegetables, horticulture or small-production crops.

"This destructive climatic pattern has taken a huge toll on crops and forages, and the timing could not have been worse for Texas producers, as all of the major agricultural commodities are enjoying strong prices," said Dr. Travis Miller, AgriLife Extension agronomist and a member of the Governor's Drought Preparedness Council.

Never before has there been so little rain before and during the primary crop growing season than this year, Nielsen-Gammon said.

"That applies to the state as a whole and most areas within the state as well," Nielsen-Gammon said. "The closest competitor at least in the short term was 1998, which was quite dry from April through July."

Prof. B.A. "Bob" Stewart, director of the West Texas A&M University's Dryland Agriculture Institute, said 2011 is unique because it has been dry, windy and had no rain. The Amarillo area averages about 14 inches of rain through mid-August, according to the National Weather Service. It's had about 2.6 inches this year.

"We have had a little bit of rain in August, but we have never had a year that approaches what this year has been," Stewart said.

Stewart talks about the "Dirty Thirties and the Filthy Fifties." While the '30s were the Dust Bowl era, a five-year stretch from 1952 through 1956 was actually drier, at least in the Texas Panhandle. Still, none of those single years compare to this one.

Perry argued scientists are coming out against climate change, but agricultural scientists and their organizations have become more vocal in warning policymakers as well. In June, the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America and Soil Science Society of America issued a joint statement that more efforts are needed to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The groups cited not only research on drought, but also increasingly intense rainfalls and floods, such as those that hit the Midwest and Northern Plains this year, flooding the Mississippi and Missouri river systems.

"Changes in climate are already affecting the sustainability of agricultural systems and disrupting production," the groups stated.

A former director of a USDA Agricultural Research Service research center in Bushland, Texas, Stewart notes the climate models show Texas getting even hotter.

"We can afford to get hotter, if we get wetter. The models don't show as good -- they are a little more mixed on what the rainfall is going to do. If we get hotter and drier, we're in a heap of trouble. We just can't survive that."

Yet Stewart also acknowledges it is incredibly hard to prove humans are having an impact on climate. He teaches a class on weather and global climate change and tells his students they will have to make up their own minds. "I'm not going to tell them, because I don't think anyone can scientifically show whether there is or is not. I personally think that man is having an influence on it. But we can't say that with 100% certainty because records show it's been warmer in the past than it is now. So we can't say that."

Nielsen-Gammon said he has difficulty explaining some of the long-term implications facing the state as a consequence of climate change, largely because people dislike the term.

"It's not a popular subject for discussion," he said. "As long as, when I'm talking to people and focusing on the data and the possibilities and individual choices on how to deal to things and react to things, the conversation successfully stays non-political. But, when we say 'We've gotten here because of that,' that's when people's hair starts standing on end."

Nielsen-Gammon still gets calls from people who believe the drought is coming from some combination of an Alaskan ionospheric research facility and chemical trails from airlines.

"It's a popular conspiracy theory," Nielsen-Gammon said.

Chris Clayton can be reached at chris.clayton@telventdtn.com

(SK/AG)

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