The cold semester that we have behind us (2024/2025) was characterized
by rainfall that, for most of Sicily, allowed a good recovery comparedto the long deficit of the previous year. The exception is, in part, the
westernmost and south-western Sicily where a deficit still remains,
albeit mitigated compared to 2024. ---- Many reservoirs, consequently,
have gained several million cubic meters and the Ancipa reservoir, one
of the most affected by the drought, has recovered to the point of
reaching a filling value very close to the maximum limit (27 million
cubic meters out of 30 total, when at the beginning of December it had
reached a minimum of 250,000 cubic meters). Let us remember that this
reservoir is a high-altitude reservoir, and as such it benefits
particularly from the melting of snow that accumulates above 1300-1500
meters of altitude, and which were abundant between the end of December
and the first half of January. I emphasize this fact because creating
other high-altitude reservoirs, even if perhaps small and more
scattered, could provide greater guarantees for the water supply for
civil uses.
However, the problem for agricultural and industrial uses of water
remains: in these cases, the quantities needed are much greater than
civil needs and this remains the big problem for the island, a problem
that requires new techniques. These techniques, moreover, have already
been widely developed in the academic field but have not often been
applied in the design and general planning stage.
Returning to the climate analysis of the months behind us, we can also
mention the notable recovery of the deficit of the weather station of
Enna, one of the driest cities in the winter of 2023/2024 (climate
change is hitting the internal areas hard). From September 2024 to
today, more than 640 millimeters have fallen, a figure above the average
and, since January 2025, we are at 370-380 millimeters, also this a
figure that exceeds the normal values, and not by a little: the event of
mid-January alone determined an accumulation of over 100-120 millimeters
in just 3 days.
If in terms of rainfall, we are, with the exceptions we have mentioned,
within a more reassuring framework, we cannot be if we refer to average
temperatures. Only the month of December 2024 recorded an average
temperature close to normal, at least in the internal and mountainous
areas that benefited from the Christmas snow, which fell with
accumulation from 700 meters above sea level and above. The other months
from January onwards instead recorded average temperatures above normal.
Apart from the aforementioned long cold phase of Christmas, frosts in
exposed areas were much lower than average, and some occurred only
thanks to the phenomenon called nocturnal thermal inversion (cold air,
on clear nights, descends from the slopes and accumulates in the valley
floors) and not due to the presence of really cold air at altitude.
Therefore, the sirocco prevailed for many weeks. This, if on the one
hand kept the Arctic currents away, on the other hand was the real
protagonist, in the internal and eastern areas, of the abundant rainfall
and typical fog flows, flows that prevented daytime temperature peaks.
Ultimately, temperatures were on average or even slightly lower than
average during the day, but much higher at night. In coastal areas,
however, especially western and northern, the same sirocco has
manifested itself with a much milder character and with a consequent
much greater average thermal surplus, even 2 degrees above the norm.
Now the hot semester begins (15 April-15 October). We must hope that the
rises of the North African anticyclonic promontory are less incisive,
which, as we unfortunately know, has made a leap in quality from 2021
onwards, in a negative way obviously: if in the past its persistence,
apart from exceptional situations, lasted 7-9 days with above average
values of 3-6 degrees, in recent years it has been recorded for 12-16
days with above average values of 6-8 degrees. Another climate, what I
call the new summer. Faced with these configurations, let us remember,
there is not enough rain to guarantee the balance of agroecosystems:
losses due to evapotranspiration become so significant that even the
most abundant reserves and the most resistant crops are at risk.
It is the so-called European overheating, a surplus often double
compared to other temperate areas of the planet: climate change is
slowing down the Atlantic ocean currents with the consequent formation
of undulations that persist for weeks. In particular, the formation of a
pressure fault west of the Iberian Peninsula is recurrent, causing very
hot Saharan air to rise towards our Mediterranean. We live in one of the
symbolic places of global warming, an environment that was already very
fragile before the change, and that is now increasingly at risk.
Luca Alerci
https://www.sicilialibertaria.it/
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