The world’s biggest oil, gas and cement companies are partly responsible for California’s water shortages, a new study finds, with their planet-warming emissions shown to reduce the state’s snowpack by an annual amount roughly equal to what would fill Shasta Lake. The study, published Tuesday, is one of the first to attempt to quantify the impact of climate change, and specifically industrial pollution, on water supply and demand in the western United States. The results suggest that emissions have significantly undermined water security in the West. The research appears in the Communications Earth and Environment journal. It comes as part of the growing field of climate attribution, which seeks to disentangle the drivers of various climate problems and pave the way for solutions. 

Related: 

• Nature Communications: Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis
• Inside Climate News: The biggest carbon polluters are to blame for half of U.S. Western water lost to climate change, ‘groundbreaking’ paper says
• The Equation (Union of Concerned Scientists): Blog: 3 ways scientists can help hold major polluters accountable under the Trump administration