“Everyone complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it.” Mark Twain, 1897 (some believe Charles Dudley Warner first coined the satirical phrase).
Unless you’ve been on another continent for the last five months, you know this winter and spring have been one for the books. The Northeast and a small slice of California’s Sierras were the only places where winter seemed like winter.
A majority of states are now in moderate to exceptional drought. NOAA’s Palmer Drought Severity Index rose to its highest March level since 1895, when record keeping began, and March was the third highest index of any month behind the dustbowl months of July and August of 1934.
Couple these extremes with a little known concept of Vapor Pressure Deficit (VPD) and it’s downright scary. VPD is the difference between the amount of moisture the air can hold and the amount that is in the air. Think of a vacuum. As the deficit grows, the vacuum increases sucking moisture from soil and vegetation. In March, the VPN was 77% above normal.
The environment and drought have real world implications for everyone: Higher food costs, wildfire, and shortages in drinking water.
Since 2000, Colorado, which births the majority of the West’s rivers, has seen 19 dry years, five being the worst in record keeping. Tree ring studies confirm these 25 years have been the driest in the last 1200 years.
This week, the Bureau of Reclamation announced it was releasing between 660,000 and 1,000,000 acre feet from Wyoming’s Flaming Gorge Reservoir and reducing releases from Lake Powell by 1.48 million acre feet in an effort to keep Powell from dropping below the power pool level, where its turbines can no longer generate electricity. Most believe that is a stopgap, the level will still be reached. And some in Arizona and Nevada are furious.
March saw 80-degree weather in Colorado’s high Rockies. Unheard of. Stream flows are at record lows and it’s getting to be the time of year when rivers should be nearing their maximums.
A Gallup poll conducted this month showed that 44% of all Americans are worried about the environment and 66% believe the environment is declining and want the government to do more to prevent it. It’s an election year so let’s talk about the other 34%.
Democrats and Republicans are both minorities. In 2025, 45-46% of all registered voters nationwide were registered independents. The remaining 54% are split equally between Democrats and Republicans at roughly 27% each.
While partisan media and social media drive shrill theories and false narratives on both sides, the important story is that 38% of Republicans believe the climate and environment are worsening and want action. The poll also showed 66% of independents and 84% of registered Democrats believed the same thing. All these numbers mean one thing: 75% of registered voters believe the environment is worsening, climate change is real, and we need to do more. That is an astounding statistic on any issue in an election year.
As we are just beginning the spring and summer, when droughts historically worsen, I wonder what the polls will say in the fall?