Photograph by Tim Shell
California governor Jerry Brown has officially declared a drought emergency in California, which will allow the golden state to seek federal aid.
Brown has appealed to the public to limit their water use, and hopes to reduce the volume of water used by as much as 20% before instigating mandatory water conservations programmes in the future if the drought continues, saying:
“All I can report to you is that it is not raining today and it is not likely to rain for several weeks”
California may be heading towards a historically dry year, with the rainfall so far during the 2013-14 water year less than it was during the last major drought in 1977, the year in which Brown took office as state governor.
California’s reservoirs are currently at less than half their capacity, and California’s mountains have less than a fifth of their normal snowpack which would normally melt to refill those reservoirs.