This juvenile bald eagle near Brandy Creek suffered heat stroke on July 6, 2024, the park's hottest day in recorded history. Fortunately, park staff and others helped the eagle hydrate and regain its health. This is the park's first known wildlife heat stroke incident.
Record Heat and Rising Challenges: Human-Cuased Climate Change at Whiskeytown
“Here was have a problem: America is addicted to oil.” – U.S. President George W. Bush
Whiskeytown National Recreation Area set a new record high temperature on Saturday, July 6, 2024, when afternoon temperatures peaked at 118 degrees at Park Headquarters on Whiskeytown Lake – 118 degrees!!! The previous record high temperature was 116 degrees.
Other examples where human-caused climate change has proved problematic and dangerous at Whiskeytown recently include the following:
From late July to early September 2021, air quality on Whiskeytown Lake was in the extremely hazardous index due to megafires burning throughout inland Northern California.
The three-year period beginning in the winter of 2019/2020 and ending in the winter of 2021/2022 was the driest three year period on record.
The Carr Fire of 2018, the most destructive fire in National Park System history in terms of percentage of park burned (97%) and number of park structures lost (over 100), began during a record tying heatwave in which afternoon temperatures topped out at 111 degrees.
Overview
As a conservation and science based agency legislatively directed since 1916 to preserve and protect the National Park System of the United States for the American people, the U.S. National Park Service is extremely concerned about anthropogenic climate change. Continue reading down this page to learn what exactly is happening to the climate, how it is effecting Whiskeytown, how the park is using renewable energy, and what you can do to help.
Thank you for reading up on this critical subject; we appreciate your interest and need your care and support.
Where's the lake?! Invisible due to heavy smoke, for five and a half weeks in August and September 2021, hazardous air quality sat over Whiskeytown Lake. Smoky skies and wildfires have been increasing in the past several decades, in part due to climate change.
NPS
August 2021: Not Your Normal View of the Lake
Whiskeytown National Recreation Area is a "traditional" national park in that the heaviest visitation falls in the summertime from Memorial Day to Labor Day. But throughout August 2021, Whiskeytown was eerily quiet. Boaters didn't boat. Swimmers didn't swim. Anglers didn't angle. And interpretive park rangers didn't facilitate kayak and paddleboard programs to the public. Extremely heavy smoke sat over Whiskeytown and brought with it the most toxic air quality in park history (one longtime employee remembers that only the summer of 2008 was comparable).
With major fires blazing to the east, south, and west of Whiskeytown, air quality indexes regularly recorded extremely hazardous health conditions. Low visibility was the norm. Because indoor air quality was just as bad as outside in many cases, the park was forced to spend thousands of dollars purchasing air purifiers so employees could continue to complete office work safely. Biggest of all, park visitors - the American public - were largely unable to enjoy their national recreation area.
Smoky skies and fires have been increasing in California over the course of the last several decades, and climate change is one of the reasons for this. What is climate change and how is it affecting Whiskeytown? What can you and I do to mitigate the effects of it? Continue reading to learn about climate change as it relates to Whiskeytown National Recreation Area.
What is climate change?
Climate change is the change in global or regional climate patterns over time. This term is most commonly used to refer to the global warming trend of unusually high surface temperatures we have seen since the Industrial Revolution of the late 1800s and particularly in the last 75 years. The vast majority of professional scientists attribute this recent warming to increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by the use of fossil fuels. To a lesser extent, buildup of other greenhouse gases such as methane are also contributing to warming. Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide trap heat that otherwise would be released into space. Although there is natural fluctuation of temperatures on Earth, the levels of carbon dioxide in the air and the acceleration of average global temperatures we are currently seeing are unprecedented.
According to NASA, 2010 to 2019 was the warmest decade on record, and 2016 and 2020 tie for the hottest years on record. This kind of heat poses substantial risks to human health, and deaths are increasing due to both heat itself and more frequent occurrence of natural disasters. Many extreme weather events such as wildfires, heatwaves, hurricanes, and droughts have happened more frequently and with more intensity than we’ve seen historically. “The weather seems to be on steroids,” notes climate change activist Greta Thunberg. Greta also notes that “The world has a fever.”
We can compare today’s climate trends with prehistoric climate trends using tree rings and ice cores to show that the current conditions are not normal. Growth cycles can be seen in tree rings, and this gives scientists clues as to what the weather was like during the tree’s lifespan. The tree rings tell us about climate history going back hundreds and even thousands of years, and ice cores have air bubbles that preserve pockets of prehistoric air and can indicate the levels of different gases in the air at different times throughout history. These methods both point to a climate that is vastly different than anything we have ever seen before.
Carr Fire and Whiskeytown Lake. Fires have been a part of the park's ecosystems for thousands of years, but recently, fires in the western U.S. have become larger and more destructive. Climate change is one of the reasons for this.
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Climate Change at Whiskeytown
Because the daily weather has been recorded at park headquarters almost daily since 1960, Whiskeytown National Recreation Area has been able to use this 60+ years of data to see how the local climate has changed during this time. So, what does this data tell us?
First and foremost, it’s getting warmer at Whiskeytown, especially at night. Since 1960, the daily average low temperature at Park Headquarters has increased by 4.5 degrees, while the daily average high temperature has increased by 1.6 degrees.
How do these increasing temperatures effect your visits to the park? How will they effect your future visits? Will you have greater chances of nasty sunburns? Will you have greater chances of getting heat exhaustion or heat stroke? The answers to these questions are an unequivocal yes.
It deserves mentioning here that in late July of 2018, during the beginning of the Carr Fire, temperatures at park headquarters were recorded at 111 degrees, thus tying the all-time high for these days. The Carr Fire itself was the most destructive fire in National Park System history, with 97% of the national recreation area burned and over 100 structures lost. That the megafire started during a record-tying heatwave makes global warming-climate change loom large. Read local resident and author Celeste White's experiences during the Carr Fire [Link coming soon].
Additionally, on July 6, 2024, Park Headquarters set a new all-time high temperature when afternoon heat peaked at 118 degrees. The previous record high was 116. With the exception of certain areas of the Southern California desert, Las Vegas, and Phoenix, Whiskeytown and Redding often have the hottest summertime temperatures in the United States—and it is getting hotter in Whiskeytown and Redding.
Beyond warming temperatures, Whiskeytown’s weather data shows that the 60 inches of annual average rainfall has remained about the same since 1960. However, it's important to note that the norm for decades has been winter precipitation varying considerably from year to year. Yet while the ping-ponging back and forth between really wet winters and really dry winters seems to be relatively standard for the area, the three-winter, three-year period including 2019/2020, 2020/2021 and 2021/2022 was the driest three-year period on record.
Again, thanks to our daily weather recordings at Park Headquarters, we know the following about these three extremely dry winters...
February 2020 was the first February on record with 0.00 inches of precipitation. February is historically one of the wettest months in the park.
The second driest February on record was February 2022, when just 0.04 inches of rain fell on park headquarters.
The water year occurring July 1st, 2020 to June 30th, 2021 was the driest year on record. 21 inches of rain fell on park headquarters during this 12-month period, or only 35% of normal.
What have you observed regarding climate change at Whiskeytown?
What will you observe in future years at Whiskeytown?
When will the next large fire hit Whiskeytown?
What have you experienced in your own community?
Please feel free to share with us your climate stories. You can email us at WHIS_Information@nps.gov.
Solar power farm at the Whiskey Creek Water Treatment facility.
Mitigating Climate Change at Whiskeytown
As problematic and dangerous as human-caused climate change is, the good news is that the United States already has the knowledge and technology to stop it.
To stop climate change, many leaders including Bill Gates and Greta Thunberg note that our oil-centric society must massively reduce our use of fossil fuels (oil, coal, and natural gas) and massively increase our use of renewable energy (solar power and wind power).
The National Park Service takes climate change and mitigation efforts seriously, including clean, renewable energy. Whiskeytown National Recreation Area first began installing solar panels in the 1990s and today, part of the Visitor Center, a wastewater treatment facility, and dozens of parking lot streetlights are powered by the sun. Solar energy is renewable and does not emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Whiskeytown is also working to mitigate climate change by educating visitors. In summer 2021, the park employed a California Climate Action Corps fellow courtesy of funding by the Office of the California Governor. This fellow, Corina Reed, processed thousands of daily weather entries from park headquarters so that we could publish the data on this webpage (thanks so much, Corina!).
Beach Bus! Ridesharing is a great way to save money on expensive gasoline and it also reduces the amount of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere. Ride the Beach Bus to Whiskeytown and you can also get into the park for free.
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Ways You Can Help
USE ALTERNATIVE TRANSPORTATION
Minimize your carbon footprint by taking advantage of the Beach Bus, provided by our partners at the Redding Area Bus Authority. This free transportation service runs during the summer, offering convenient rides to and from the park and downtown Redding. By choosing ridesharing options, you help reduce the number of cars on the road and contribute to cleaner air and atmosphere. See the Beach Bus' schedule.
FOLLOW FIRE RESTRICTIONS
During dry summer months, Whiskeytown enforces bans on open flame fires, including campfires and charcoal BBQs. Adhering to these rules helps prevent human-caused wildfires, protecting the forests that act as natural carbon sinks by absorbing and storing carbon dioxide. Learn about how Whiskeytown manages fire.
ASSESS YOUR LIFESTYLE
Use a carbon footprint calculator to identify which aspects of your lifestyle contribute most to carbon emissions. Simple adjustments, such as driving and flying less or modifying your diet to include more locally sourced foods and less meat, can significantly reduce your carbon footprint.
CONTINUE LEARNING
Climate change activist Greta Thunberg notes that “The most effective way to get out of this mess is to educate ourselves,” and we agree! And so, again, thank you for reading this Whiskeytown climate change webpage. We invite you to continue learning and reading. Read Carr Fire excerpts from Celeste White [Link coming soon], a park neighbor and local author. Additionally, if you are a teacher or belong to a community group, schedule a " Climate Change & Sustainability at Whiskeytown" field trip program or in-classroom/virtual presentation. Email us at WHIS_Information@nps.gov to schedule this free ranger-led program or for more information.
To learn more about climate change in the national parks and to see how the National Park Service is responding, visit www.nps.gov/climatechange.
Article written by Dani Niswander and Scott Einberger. 2021-2022.
