UC Irvine Earth System Science professor Jay Famiglietti. Photo by Daniel A. Anderson, UC Irvine.

Water supplies are dwindling around the world, and a rapidly changing climate will likely make the situation far worse in coming decades.

And with a likelihood of increasing drought, Southern California is in the “crosshairs.”

That is the message conveyed by UC Irvine Earth System Science Professor Jay Famiglietti in “Last Call at the Oasis,” a new film now showing in Irvine.

Famiglietti is one of the experts who appears in the film, delivering his warning about too-rapid drawdown of water supplies, and a changing climate that will render some parts of the world too dry while inundating others.

He can back up his claims. Using NASA satellite data, Famiglietti for years has studied the effects of climate change on water movement around the world.

He’s measured depletion of groundwater in California’s Central Valley. And while that appears to be mostly the result of over pumping, a changing climate will likely continue to reduce the snowpack in the Sierra, in turn reducing the amount of snowmelt that can be captured and stored.

The film was made by the same company behind Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth,” as well as “Food, Inc.,” and directed by Academy Award winner Jessica Yu.

It is showing at Edwards University Town Center.

Q. What is the thrust of the film?

A. It paints a picture of the global water crisis, and most important, many aspects happening right here in the United States already. Water quality and water availability are worsening. There are issues of water pollution all around the world. It kind of looks around at other countries — Australia and Singapore and the Middle East — and looks at what people are doing in other countries to tackle their water problems. And it offers those as advice on what we may do here in the United States.

Some of these countries are further along in their problems. Australia is in the middle of a prolonged drought — more realistically, probably climate change. They’re going to be having severe water shortages in the future. It’s used as an example of how to deal with water conflict peacably.

Q. What is your role in the movie?

A. My role is (as) one of the featured experts. The movie is really composed as a set of vignettes, really a set of stories. It starts in Las Vegas, goes to California, goes to Australia. Then back in the United States, in Michigan, in Hinckley, California, with Erin Brockovich.  My story is mostly about California. We get brought back to it a few different times.

Q. What are the implications for the United States, the western U.S.? What is going on with our water?

A. In the western U.S. the situation we’re facing is much more (one of) quantity than quality. With climate change comes a decrease in snowpack. We rely on snowpack for our water supply. By the end of the century it will mostly be gone. And the other thing we face in the western part of the country is population growth. And so those two together will pose great challenges for water managers, to figure out where the water will come from and how to get the water to this growing population in the face of this changing climate and disappearing snowpack.

Q. Is the reduction in snowpack definitely the result of climate change?

A. Oh yeah. And other issues in California are going to be food production and groundwater depletion in the Central Valley. So altogether it is not a pretty picture. When you think about all the things that are happening in California — disappearing snowpack, disappearing groundwater, population growth, impacts on food security, and of course the economy, not only of California but of the nation — it’s quite a compelling story.

Q. Is the loss of groundwater also related to climate change?

A. Yes and no. The reason it is related to climate change is through recharge and replenishment of groundwater. Most of the groundwater in the Central Valley has accumulated there over thousands and thousands of years. And so we’re using it now at a much faster rate than it is being replenished. The climate change part comes in with lack of snowmelt that would normally come in with the groundwater.

It’s disappearing because we’re using it a lot. When farmers stopped getting surface water allocations from the Delta, surface water was reduced by as much as 90 percent. Farmers had no choice but to start pumping groundwater to meet their irrigation needs. That’s when we start seeing a very very big decline in groundwater. It’s a very natural human response to drought. When you have a drought, you don’t have any rain, there’s not as much stream flow, not as much snow in our case. We’re hitting the reserve very hard, and it’s one that won’t be replenished.

We live in a part of the world that is going to see more and more drought. I think we’re fooled into thinking we’re not going to be because of the great infrastructure we have to move water from Northern California to Southern California. The reality is, we’re going to see more (drought). Much of Southern California right now is in the crosshairs of climate change. We’re in that part of the world that is going to get drier.

Q. Is there more we should do? Conservation, production, recycling?

A. Whenever we look at the water budget in almost any area, most of it is used for agriculture. All around the world, about 80 percent of the water is used for agriculture. So the biggest gains that can be made, with respect to conservation, will be made in agriculture. We talk about conservation and efficiency together. So doing things more efficiently and conserving are the same thing. They go hand in hand.

The biggest segment of home water use goes to irrigation. Sprinklers, lawn and landscape irrigation. Anything we can do to cut back on that, whether it’s watering existing landscape less, cut way way back on it, or replace it with more drought tolerant vegetation — those are some of the best things we can do. Home landscaping accounts for somewhere between 50 and 75 poercent of home water use, at least in the dry parts of the world.

In the house, toilets and showers, those are the biggest ones. More efficient toilets, shorter showers, all the usual stuff.

But people really need to think about it because we are, again, in the crosshairs.

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Murky sky over Rancho Santa Margarita Wednesday morning. Photo by Marie Stupecky, Irvine.

Orange County should see its coolest day of the week Friday with thick clouds promising light rain, the National Weather Service says.

But the weather turns around in time for Memorial Day, when skies should be mostly sunny and inland highs could reach 80.

At the moment a low-pressure air system is running the show, bringing cloudy skies and rain chances throughout the day and into the evening.

The best chance of rain, in fact, is in the evening when the heart of the system moves through Southern California, though forecasters say we’re unlikely to see more than a tenth of an inch in those areas that see rain.

Highs should stay in an unseasonable 62 to 67 range, and winds could gust to 25 mph in the evening.

Saturday is partly cloudy, then mostly sunny as remnants of the low pressure system linger. Expect highs of 67 to 72 inland, 64 to 69 on the coast.

Sunday also is partly cloudy, then mostly sunny, with highs inching up a bit more: 71 to 76 inland, 64 to 69 on the coast.

Memorial Day’s pattern is the same, with mostly sunny skies after a partly cloudy morning with some patchy fog thrown in. Inland highs could reach 75 to 80, 65 to 70 on the coast.

Tuesday through Thursday mornings are some variation of morning clouds and patchy fog with skies turning mostly sunny in the afternoon.

Inland highs should be 74 to 79 inland, 65 to 70 on the coast all three days.

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The private space capsule launched Tuesday by SpaceX of Hawthorne linked up with the International Space Station at 6:56 a.m. Pacific time.

“Looks like we’ve got a dragon by the tail,” space station astronaut Don Pettit said after maneuvering the space station’s robotic arm to capture the capsule.

The capsule, which is carrying only cargo but might one day carry astronauts, is the first private vehicle to link with the orbiting laboratory.

It was launched on a Falcon 9 rocket, also built by SpaceX, the company owned by PayPal co-founder Elon Musk.

The capsule was slowly brought into position close to the space station. Then Pettit reached out and snagged the capsule with the station’s robotic arm.

Frame grab from live NASA TV image after linkup of the SpaceX "Dragon" capsule with the International Space Station. Image courtesy NASA.

Dragon was bolted to the space station’s Harmony module shortly after 9 a.m. Pacific.

Viewers could see glimpses of the SpaceX mission control room in Hawthorne, as well as at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, during the live feed of the linkup on NASA TV.

The space station crew that worked to snag the Dragon included Joe Acaba, who grew up in Anaheim.

They hoped to complete the birthing of Dragon by afternoon.

The linkup launches a new era of private, commercial space flight, with several companies aiming for Earth orbit.

SpaceX is so far leading the pack. In 2008, NASA announced a $1.6 billion contract with the company to resupply the space station with a minimum of 12 flights.

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Thomas Lane, a UC Irvine neuroimmunologist who will receive a $4.8 million to investigate a treatment for multiple sclerosis using stem cells. Photo by Steve Zylius, UC Irvine.

A UC Irvine researcher will receive $4.8 million to develop a potential treatment for multiple sclerosis using stem cells, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine announced Thursday.

Thomas Lane, a neuroimmunologist whose stem-cell treatment has allowed mice with M.S.-like disease to regain the use of their limbs, said he will use the grant to test a variety of neural stem-cell lines developed by a neurobiologist at the Scripps Research Institute, Jeanne Loring.

Further work with mice should help Lane narrow down which lines are most effective, preparing the way for trials of the treatment on human patients.

“This is a fantastic step forward for patients with this horrible disease,” Lane said Thursday.

Multiple sclerosis debilitates its victims by destroying the sheaths that protect nerve cells, called myelin. As the axons, or fibers between nerve cells, are stripped of myelin, they can degenerate, causing loss of motor skills and paralysis.

Researchers are investigating stem cells because they have the potential to become a variety of cell types within the body, holding out hope for treatment of spinal cord injury, Alzheimer’s disease and other conditions.

“When we transplanted these cells into mice with M.S.-like disease, they regained motor skills that were sustained out to about six months post-transplant,” Lane said.

The work, which Lane is preparing to submit for publication in a science journal, was done within the past year.

But much work lies ahead to learn precisely how the cells restored limb function in the mice, as well as finding the best cell lines for the job.

The grant will allow him to investigate not only the properties of human embryonic stem cells from federally approved lines, but also of “inducible pluripotent” stem cells, in which adult cells, such as skin cells, are induced to revert to state allowing them to change into many cell types.

That would avoid much of the controversy that has grown up around the use of human embryonic stem cells.

Lane is part of the Sue & Bill Gross Stem Cell Research Center at UCI, where a variety of stem-cell research projects are under way.

The center is home to Brian Cummings and Aileen Anderson, whose stem-cell treatment for spinal-cord injury is now being tested on human patients in Switzerland, and Hans Keirstead, whose stem-cell treatment for spinal cord injury became the world’s first to be tested on humans until Geron Corp. shut down the trial last November, citing economic difficulties.

UCI has so far received $76.6 million in funding from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, or CIRM.

On Thursday, the institute, created through voter initiative in 2004, gave out 21 grants worth $69 million to 11 institutions around the state.

Among them was a $5.5 million for Phil Schwartz, a neuroscientist at the Children’s Hospital of Orange County who specializes in stem-cell biology.

Schwartz is also working with mice to develop a stem-cell treatment for Hurler’s disease, a neurodegenerative disorder that affects children.

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Doheny State Beach last month. Bucking the clean trend for most O.C. beaches, it made Heal the Bay's "Beach Bummer" list in the environmental group's latest report on water quality. Register file photo by Ken Steinhardt.

Orange County continued its streak of good grades on beach water quality from a Santa Monica environmental group, with the standard exceptions: Poche Beach near San Clemente and Doheny State Beach at San Juan Creek.

Heal the Bay, which rates beaches up and down the West Coast based on bacterial readings collected by public agencies, gave 94 percent  of Orange County beaches A and B grades for water quality during dry weather in the summer and 87 percent of beaches A and B grades during dry weather in the winter.

The group’s latest report covers April through October of 2011 and November 2011 through March 2012.

Poche Beach and Doheny near the creek mouth both made the group’s top 10 “Beach Bummers,” or most polluted beaches in the state, although the list was led by Avalon Harbor Beach on Santa Catalina Island.

All seven monitoring sites between Doheny State Beach and a point 4,000 feet south of San Juan Creek also received F grades for dry weather during winter months.

And overall water quality during wet weather in O.C. was considered poor by the environmental group, with only 69 percent of monitored beaches receiving an A or B grade.

On the plus side, Orange County saw no sewage spills that led to swimming closures on beaches for 10 straight months.

The county’s 94 percent figure for As and Bs is similar to the percentage in the group’s last report, an end-of-summer report card released in September.

“From our perspective, it’s good news,” said Larry Honeybourne, program manager at the Orange County Health Care Agency, which tracks ocean-water quality. “We didn’t have a sewage spill that caused a beach closure for 10 months. That is the longest stretch of time we’ve gone in this county since we’ve been keeping records — since 1987.”

And he said 20 of the beaches between Corona del Mar and south Laguna Beach scored an A or A plus for dry and wet weather for the entire year.

The poor grades for wet weather had the usual cause, Honeybourne said: rain washing contaminants into the ocean from creeks and storm drains.

“It’s the runoff from the watershed,” he said. “The runoff contains high levels of indicator bacteria,” or the types of bacteria used to indicate the presence of human waste.

The agency issues warnings to swimmers during such episodes, he said.

In its report, Heal the Bay said bacterial levels persist at Poche Beach despite treatment efforts that began in 2010. But bacterial concentrations dropped there in 2011 after the release point for the treatment system was relocated.

The report’s authors also agreed that urban runoff was the main source of contamination at Doheny, and that a recent study suggesting that swimmers could be at increased risk there for gastrointestinal illness.

Statewide, the report says, 92 percent of California beaches received A or B grades, a rise of 2 percentage points over the previous report. Seven of the “Beach Bummer” beaches were in Los Angeles County.

See the Orange County Health Care Agency’s new web page, where you can find updates on ocean-water quality for local beaches.

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Wildfire season is starting off in the “normal” range for Southern California, fire forecasters say, though that could mean several large wildfires in the region through the summer and fall.

And by midsummer, wildfire potential should rise as weather conditions change.

“It’s not going to be until, probably, we get into later in the summer, in July and August — that’s when we’ll start to see an above-normal probability of getting some big fires,” said Tom Rolinski, a meteorologist with the U.S. Forest Service’s Fire Predictive Services group in Riverside. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to have more big fires. We’re just saying the potential is there.”

Last month, fire risk was declared above normal in large sections of the western United States for June, July and August by the National Interagency Fire Center’s Predictive Services branch.

A bit ahead of schedule, large fires have recently erupted in Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado.

Parts of central and Southern California also were placed in the “above normal” column for July and August. Reduced snowpack in the Sierra and expanding drought conditions were major factors.

A slow start to wildfire season in Orange County still could mean the eruption of smaller fires through late May, such as this 3 1/2-acre blaze in Tustin on May 12. Photo courtesy Orange County Fire Authority.

In coastal Southern California, however, we’re off to a slower start, though we could catch up quickly.

“Usually around mid to late May, we start seeing fire activity ramping up — usually small fires; sometimes we get a bigger grass fire,” Rolinski said.

Like much of the state’s, Orange County’s rainfall remains well below average,with 6.3 inches since July 1. That is nearly seven inches below normal.

But repeated bouts of light rain affected the growth of wild plants, said George Ewan, wildland fire defense planner for the Orange County Fire Authority.

“It was damp off and on,” Ewan said, through much of the winter and early spring. “We were getting storms every other week. It wasn’t a great amount, but enough to keep the soil moisture up and allow the plants to come out.”

As a result, he said, “we had two growing seasons this year.”

Now that is translating into fuel for wildfires as once-green shoots turn brown.

“Orange County is in the process of drying out very rapidly,” he said. “I would say, with the patterns going right now, we’ll see a normal season to possibly a little bit more active.”

Bump that up to “above normal” for the Santa Ana Mountains and foothills, said Fire Authority Capt. Marc Stone, who is encouraging residents in fire-prone areas of the county to get ready.

“We need to let people know they are in an area that is susceptible to fires,” he said. “They need to protect their homes.”

Orange County firefighters are now training for the wildfire season ahead.

“This time of year, they’re really going through all their stuff to make sure everything is good to go,” he said. “Everyone’s got their wildland equipment checked out; they’re doing hose lays, practicing with rigs.”

And airborne firefighters have a new tool, he said: night-vision goggles, which will also require some training and practice.

That should allow helicopter pilots to continue fighting fires at night, rather than having to give up and try to regain lost ground in the morning.

“The pilots will be able to see any wires, electrical lines, topography, the contours of hills,” Stone said. “Best of all, they’ll be able to see the hot part of the fire.

“To be going through canyons, dropping water from 300-foot elevation, banking left, banking right, right through flames and smoke. It’s like military combat.”

View list of Orange County’s worst wildfires

Find tips to prepare for wildfire on O.C. Fire Authority’s “Ready, Set, Go” web page.

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Clouds on the rise over Laguna Niguel Thursday. Photo by Linda Biram.

Orange County’s cooling trend continues Thursday, the National Weather Service says, and will likely hit its lowest point Friday as increasing clouds bring a slight chance of rain.

But forecasters still expect mostly sunny skies and a warmup for Memorial Day.

A system of low-pressure air marching south along the coast is in charge for now, strongly driving ocean air inland, swelling the coastal marine layer and pushing temperatures down.

Thursday starts off cloudy, then remains partly cloudy, with inland highs of 69 to 74, 64 to 69 on the coast. Winds from the south could reach 15 mph by afternoon.

Then wind gusts rise as high as 25 mph overnight as clouds thicken and perhaps deliver some patchy drizzle.

That leads to a 20 percent chance of rain Friday lasting into the night. Friday also should be the coolest day of the week, with highs of 63 to 68 under mostly cloudy skies.

Winds from the southwest could gust to 25 mph.

Temperatures begin to recover Saturday under partly cloudy skies, with inland highs of 67 to 72, 63 to 68 on the coast.

Sunday is a bit warmer as high pressure rebuilds, with highs of 71 to 76 inland and 64 to 69 on the coast under mostly sunny skies after a partly cloudy morning.

The pattern is the same for Memorial Day if you add patchy morning fog, and warmer still: 74 to 79 inland, 65 to 70 on the coast.

Tuesday goes from mostly cloudy to mostly sunny. Highs are about the same as Monday’s.

And Wednesday is partly cloudy with patchy fog, then mostly sunny, with temperatures notching up into the 75 to 80 range inland, 66 to 71 on the coast.

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Morning gloom in Rossmoor earlier this month. Photo by George Post, Rossmoor.

Orange County temperatures will take a dive through the end of the week, the National Weather Service says, with clouds and patches of drizzle in the morning through Friday.

But a turnaround Sunday should bring a return to sunny skies and warmer weather in time for Memorial Day.

For now, back-to-back low-pressure air systems are expected to keep things cool. The second, stronger system, in fact, should hold highs to the 60s Friday and Saturday.

The first low-pressure “trough” over the western United States will be in the driver’s seat for the next few days, pulling the cooling ocean influence onshore.

Wednesday and Thursday should see low clouds, patchy fog and some drizzle in the morning and partly cloudy skies later.

Inland highs should be 72 to 77 Wednesday, 70 to 75 Thursday. On the coast it’s 65 to 70 Wednesday, perhaps shaving off a degree or so Thursday.

Winds from the southeast could gust to 25 mph overnight Thursday, and on Friday could be added to the mix of low clouds with morning drizzle.

The arrival of the second low pressure system should drive temperatures down further, with highs reaching only the 62 to 67 range.

On Saturday it’s 64 to 69 and partly cloudy after low morning clouds.

Sunday’s highs tick up a bit under sunny skies after morning clouds as high pressure moves in from the ocean, while the marine layer shrinks.

It should be 70 to 75 inland, 64 to 69 on the coast.

Memorial Day also is sunny after morning fog and clouds clear out, and warmer still: 73 to 78 inland, 65 to 70 at the beach.

Tuesday’s pattern is about the same, and so are coastal temperatures, with inland highs of 75 to 80.

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The quake was 12 miles southwest of El Centro and 14 miles west of Mexicali, Mexico, according to a preliminary report from the U.S. Geological Survey.

People as far away as Burbank and North Hollywood reported feeling the quake, although such reports are unverified and unlikely at that distance for a 4.0 quake, said USGS geophysicist Bob Dollar.

The quake also was reported felt in San Diego.

“I think it’s an aftershock to the El Mayor Cucupah earthquake,” Dollar said. “It’s in theat northwest zone where there are a lot of little splays coming off the fault.”

The area spawned numerous aftershocks in the weeks and months after the April 4, 2010 quake, but they can occur even two years later.

“The rate of aftershocks dies down exponentially with time,” Dollar said. “But you can still have aftershocks after an earthquake that big after several years.”

The Baja quake caused an estimated $90 million damage in California’s Imperial Valley, as well as an estimated $440 million in Baja’s Mexicali Valley. It was strongly felt in Orange County.

Dollar said he did not expect Tuesday’s 4.0 quake to cause damage, though it might have “rattled shelves.”

Scientists are keeping close watch on quakes in the area, said UC Irvine seismologist Lisa Grant Ludwig, in part because of potential connections between fault systems there and the Elsinore fault that runs just east of the Santa Ana Mountains.

“Only a few faults could give us a pretty strong shake in Orange County, and Elsinore is one of them,” she said.

She said she also felt a small magnitude 2.4 quake in Irvine about 4:30 p.m. Monday, reported by hundreds of others in the area.

Scientists at USGS encourage those who feel earthquakes to report them on the agency’s Did You Feel It? web page.

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A privately built space capsule rocketed toward the International Space Station early Tuesday, aiming for a history-making linkup with the orbiting laboratory and kicking off an entrepreneurial era in space flight.

The private rocket’s second stage also bore aloft the ashes of James Doohan, “Star Trek’s” Scotty, along with those of more than 300 others.

At 12:44 a.m. Pacific time, the Falcon 9 rocket built by SpaceX of Hawthorne lifted off from Cape Canaveral, carrying the company’s “Dragon” space capsule, a NASA statement said.

On this flight, the capsule is bearing only supplies, but the company, owned by PayPal co-founder Elon Musk, could ferry astronauts into orbit in the years ahead.

The space capsule will be put through a series of navigational tests before controllers decide whether to allow it to come close to the space station.

But if all goes well, space station astronauts will reach out Friday with the space station’s robotic arm, snag the capsule and connect it to a port on the space station’s Harmony module.

Because it’s a test flight, the 1,200 pounds of cargo in the capsule is non-critical, mostly food and clothing.

It was the second try for SpaceX after high pressure in one of the rocket’s nine engines caused a takeoff attempt to be aborted early Saturday.

The capsule has been tested successfully in orbit once before. The rocket was launched successfully twice before Tuesday’s liftoff.

The ashes of Doohan as well as Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper were among those carried in the rocket’s second stage, which is discarded in space. Ashes were placed aboard a Falcon 1 rocket in 2008, but that launch failed.

SpaceX has big plans for its rocket and capsule.

In 2008, NASA announced a $1.6 billion contract with SpaceX to resupply the space station with a minimum of 12 flights.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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