Hell On Earth: Major City Will RUN OUT Of Water In Less Than 95 Days

If you’ve ever needed a reason to store extra food and water, this just might be it.  Cape Town, South Africa is on schedule to run out of water in less than 95 days, and when they do, the government will turn off the taps.

“There are only 95 days left before we reach Day Zero,” the City of Cape Town announced on January 15 in a statement. “Day Zero has moved a day closer this week to April 21, 2018. Day Zero is when the City will be forced to turn off most of the taps.”

The coastal South African city has been battling droughts for nearly three years, amounting to the worst one in their history. With little rain on the horizon, the city has now ordered its 3.7 million residents to drastically cut their water consumption, take short stop-start showers, not wash their cars, and flush toilets as little as possible. If they don’t, all of their taps could be shut off by the government in April.

The city doesn’t appear to have any plan in place for such a SHTF event. But if the government cannot find a solution to the problem, Capetonians will be forced into “bread lines” for water. As if that isn’t scary enough, city residents will have a limit of 5.5 gallons of water a day that will only be given to them at specific government outposts around the city.

Cape Town’s mayor Patricia de Lille‏ tweeted: “I cannot stress it enough: all residents must save water and use less than 87 liters [19 gallons] per day… We must avoid Day Zero and saving water is the only way we can do this.” Not missing the opportunity to levy extra taxes on the populace, the city mayor has also impeded a “drought charge” in order to fund new water projects, such as constructing desalination plants.

The climate alarmists are out in full force too, quickly blaming the drought (natural occurrences throughout Earth’s history) on the junk science of “climate change.”

The earlier part of the drought in 2015 was largely blamed on the El Niño weather pattern, however, as the situation continues to worsen, experts are now pointing towards poor city management [government incompetence], a growing urban population, and – you guessed it – climate change. –IFLScience

Climate alarmists act like raising taxes in the name of global warming will somehow make the rain start falling. But preparing yourself for a situation such as this one requires storing your own water, and knowing how to properly filter water discovered.  More and more, humans are having to prepare themselves for the government incompetence that makes horrible situations like this so much worse.

Off-grid living expert Scott Hunt said:

The key to beating a drought has always been storage. Water storage can make the difference between a harvest or crop failure, life or death. There are many methods to storing water. Digging reservoirs or ponds to collect the water when it does rain.  Having buried cisterns will beat the effects of evaporation that accompany drought conditions. Using 55-gallon drums of treated water in your home can be a huge blessing when the tap runs dry or the source has been contaminated.

All of this can be done without the government, so you aren’t left waiting in line for your government rationed water.

She"s Back! La Niña Is Here For The Second Consecutive Year

For the second consecutive time in two years, La Niña (translated from Spanish as “little girl”) is back and she means business. New data from Climate.gov indicates La Niña conditions have formed just in time for winter weather in the Northern Hemisphere.

On Thursday, the Climate Prediction Center confirmed La Niña after analyzing October ocean temperatures cooling along the equatorial eastern and central Pacific Ocean. La Niña is often declared when sea surface temperatures in the region (just stated) decline by 0.5 degrees Celsius.

John Morales‏, Chief Meteorologist WTVJ NBC-6 Miami, shows the progression of cool water over the equatorial Pacific Ocean responsible for La Niña formation.

For the second consecutive northern hemisphere cool season, we are officially now in a #LaNina as per @NWSCPC https://t.co/wv7pR1lO7h pic.twitter.com/bccFHgwNnf

— John Morales (@JohnMoralesNBC6) November 9, 2017

The cooler waters have an influence on atmospheric conditions by decreasing evaporation in the tropics, which is a major driver of global weather.

According to the Weather Channel,

A typical La Niña winter in the U.S. brings cold and snow to the Northwest and unusually dry conditions to most of the southern tier of the U.S., according to the prediction center.

 

The Southeast and Mid-Atlantic also tend to see warmer-than-average temperatures during a La Niña winter. New England and the Upper Midwest into New York tend to see colder-than-average temperatures.

Climate Prediction Center /NCEP/NWS Full Report: La Niña conditions are predicted to continue (~65-75% chance) at least through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2017-18.

During October, weak La Niña conditions emerged as reflected by below-average sea surface temperatures (SSTs) across most of the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean [Fig. 1]. The weekly Niño indices were variable during the month, with values near -0.5° C during the past week in the Niño-3.4 and Niño-3 regions [Fig. 2]. Sub-surface temperatures remained below average during October [Fig. 3], reflecting the anomalously shallow depth of the thermocline across the central and eastern Pacific [Fig. 4]. Also, convection was suppressed near the International Date Line and slightly enhanced over parts of the Maritime Continent and the Philippines [Fig. 5]. Over the equatorial Pacific Ocean, low-level trade winds were mainly near average, but the upper-level winds were strongly anomalously westerly and the Southern Oscillation Index was positive. Overall, the ocean and atmosphere system reflects the onset of La Niña conditions.

 

For the remainder of the Northern Hemisphere fall and winter 2017-18, a weak La Niña is favored in the model averages of the IRI/CPC plume [Fig. 6] and also in the North American Multi-Model Ensemble (NMME) [Fig. 7]. The consensus of forecasters is for the event to continue through approximately February-April 2018. In summary, La Niña conditions are predicted to continue (~65-75% chance) at least through the Northern Hemisphere winter (click CPC/IRI consensus forecast for the chance of each outcome for each 3-month period).

 

La Niña is likely to affect temperature and precipitation across the United States during the upcoming months (the 3-month seasonal temperature and precipitation outlooks will be updated on Thursday November 16th). The outlooks generally favor above-average temperatures and below-median precipitation across the southern tier of the United States, and below-average temperatures and above-median precipitation across the northern tier of the United States.

La Niña weather phenomenon easily explained:

Ben Noll, Meteorologist, National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research of New Zealand, compares the equatorial sea-surface temperatures in 2016 and 2017. His findings indicate 2017 waters “not as large farther west” when compared with 2016. Basically he validates NOAA’s “weaker La Niña” claim...

Compare early November equatorial SSTs in two consecutive #LaNina years.

2016: Coldest anomaly in central Pacific, above normal near South America.
2017: Coldest anomaly near South America, anomalies not as large farther west.

An important difference as we go forward! pic.twitter.com/2fjXfjjVOD

— Ben Noll (@BenNollWeather) November 10, 2017

NOAA’s winter weather outlook indicates normal participation for the mid-tier of the United States. The southern-tier is forecasted to see much drier conditions. Meanwhile, the Great Lakes region and Northwest of the United States appear to have much wetter conditions.

Temperature outlooks for this winter include at-least 2/3 of the United States well above average. Below average to normal in regions, such as the Great Lakes region and Northwest.

Bottomline: What do weather forecasters and Dennis Gartman both have in common?... Well you guessed it– terrible forecasting...

Worst Hurricane Season In A Decade Threatens Gulf Coast Production

Authored by Nick Cunningham via OilPrice.com,

2017 could be an “above-normal” year for large hurricanes, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a potential problem for Gulf Coast oil drillers and refiners.

NOAA puts the odds of an “above-normal” season for hurricanes at 45 percent, while the chances of a normal and below-normal season are at 35 and 20 percent, respectively. In fact, they said that there is a 70 percent likelihood of 11 to 17 named storms, which are storms that have 39 mile-per-hour winds or higher. About 5 to 9 of those could become hurricanes (winds of 74 mph or higher); 2 to 4 of which could become major hurricanes (winds of 111 mph or higher). The average season (which runs from June through November) tends to have just 12 named storms, so the potential for 17 named storms puts the 2017 hurricane season in more treacherous territory.

"We"re expecting a lot of storms this season," Gerry Bell, lead seasonal hurricane forecaster with NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, told reporters. "Whether it"s above normal or near normal, that"s a lot of hurricanes."

Part of the reason for the expected uptick in hurricane activity is because the El Nino phenomenon is not expected to show up. El Ninos tend to suppress hurricanes. Also, sea-surface temperatures are above-average, which contributes to stronger storms.

There has been a decade-long lull in major hurricanes that have struck the U.S., but there is a growing probability that that changes this year.

That should be cause for concern for the oil and gas industry, much of which is located along the Gulf Coast. They have been spared the worst that Mother Nature has to offer for quite some time.

In 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, which struck the Gulf Coast within a couple of weeks of each other, destroyed 115 oil platforms and damaged 52 others, leading to the “near total shut-down of the Gulf’s offshore oil and gas production,” according to the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement. While the effects were mostly temporary, nine months later as much as 22 percent of oil production and 13 percent of gas production in federal waters remained offline.

WTI oil prices jumped more than 20 percent within a few weeks because of the outages, from $57 in mid-July to $69 per barrel on September 1, several days after the storm made landfall.

The industry is much better prepared these days than it was then, with improved standards on new rigs and much better processes for evacuation and subsequent return to production. Today’s rigs can withstand higher waves and stronger winds. They also can position themselves using GPS rather than being moored to the seafloor. Storm prediction is also vastly improved. As such, even a major hurricane on the scale of Katrina is unlikely to be as damaging as it was in 2005.

Still, outages can still occur, taking crude oil production and refining offline. The averaged named storm can slash output in the Gulf by an average of 169,000 bpd month-on-month, according to BTU Analytics. Much of that tends to come back online quickly, but that isn’t guaranteed. “It takes more than a flip of a switch to get a refinery back up and running,” the American Petroleum Institute says, and pipelines cannot operate if they do not have power.

Moreover, there have been few test cases since the disaster of 2005. In 2008, an estimated 60 oil and gas platforms were destroyed from Hurricanes Ike and Gustav. A slow-moving Hurricane Isaac in 2012 destroyed some onshore storage facilities. Other than that, there have only been relatively manageable storms. The outcome from a Category 5 storm is uncertain.

But one other factor working in the industry’s favor is that there just aren’t as many rigs deployed in the Gulf as there was ten years ago. The U.S. offshore rig count stands at 23 as of mid-May, down from over 100 back in 2005-2007.

(Click to enlarge)

Given the state of the oil market today, even a major hurricane might not be enough to really move the needle all that much on oil prices. Inventories are still sky-high, and many analysts are expecting only modest increases in prices this year, with questions still lingering about a possible glut in 2018. However, the warning from NOAA that hurricane season could be much more active this year bears watching.