Parts of Portugal could become desert - report

[FVZA_Colonel]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060130/sc_nm/environment_portugal_dc



Parts of Portugal could become desert
report By Axel Bugge

LISBON (Reuters) - Portugal's south risks turning into a desert as temperatures rise, its coasts will erode and droughts will become more frequent, the country's most complete report on the impact of global warming showed on Monday.

The report, which is the result of a research project that started in 1999, concludes that Portugal will be one of the hardest hit by global warming in Europe in coming decades.

"I think the biggest impact is the risk of desertification in the interior of the south," Filipe Duarte Santos, a physics professor who oversaw the project, told Reuters.

"...The indication is less rainfall, higher temperatures, more frequent extreme events, such as droughts which will become more frequent."

[Alexander]

1. Isn't Europe the only continent with no deserts?

Whoops.

Of course, judging by people around here, southern Portugal would be just the place to create shopping malls, pools and watered golf courses and suburban sprawl.

[Up2Late]

4. I thought most of Spain was already semi-arid?

...I know Southern France has the same sort of climate as Southern California.

[barb162]

5. Spain is pretty darn arid, let me tell you and it gets so damn hot

in summer. People don't realize it's about 3 miles or something from Morocco and people think of Morocco as a desert (and it is).

[SoCalDem]

2. Gotta have trees if you don;t want deserts eventaully

Trees create their own weather if you get enough of them together.. That's why rain levels FALL when rain forests get turned into plywood ..

[BrotherBuzz]

3. Gotta have trees for corks!

Portugal is home to the largest cork-oak forests in the world, found in the southern (Algarve) and south-central (Alentejo) parts of the country. The cork oak trees preserve the region's thin soils and scarce groundwater. Without them, the area will quickly become a desert and virtually uninhabitable for humans.