California drought: 'May have to migrate people'

Mark Koba in CNBC: It's going from worse to worst each week in California. Suffering in its third year of drought, more than 58 percent of the state is currently in "exceptional drought" stage, according to the latest U.S. Drought Monitor map. That marks a huge jump from just seven days ago, when about 36 percent of the state was categorized that way.

Exceptional drought, the most extreme category, indicates widespread crop and pasture losses and shortages of water in reservoirs, streams and wells.

If the state continues on this path, there may have to be thoughts about moving people out, said Lynn Wilson, academic chair at Kaplan University and who serves on the climate change delegation in the United Nations.

"Civilizations in the past have had to migrate out of areas of drought," Wilson said. "We may have to migrate people out of California." Wilson added that before that would happen, every option such as importing water to the state would likely occur— but "migration can't be taken off the table."

The drought has nearly depleted the state's surface water—which is seen being reduced by about one-third this year. Farmers in California have turned to groundwater to keep crops irrigated. That has led to fears of depleted groundwater in the years ahead if that continues, according to a report released earlier this month.

"So far, groundwater has helped get crops to market and keep food prices in line," said Jay Lund, director of the Center for Watershed Sciences at the University of California, Davis, which released the report....

The July 29, 2014 US Drought Monitor for the western US. Red is "extreme drought" and brown is "exceptional drought"