NOAA Drought Seminar: Progress and Challenges on Understanding Snow Droughts in the Western United States

Mountain snowpack acts as the water towers of the Western United States and provides the majority of freshwater used for agriculture and public consumption. Years with below-average snowpack, known as snow droughts, can cause water shortages and landscape impacts such as increased drying of soil moisture and vegetation. Progress has been made in the research community over the past decade to try and define snow droughts and understand some of the drivers and impacts, but challenges remain including an agreed upon method or definition that can be used by the operational community (e.g., forecasters and natural resource managers). Another major monitoring and communication challenge is that snow drought impacts on the timing and quantity of water supply can vary greatly across the West depending on the underlying causes (low precipitation, warm temperatures, or both). 

In this virtual seminar, Dan McEvoy, a researcher at the Desert Research Institute, will describe some ways snow droughts are defined, the role of warming temperatures on snow droughts, atmospheric drivers, and ongoing efforts to communicate real-time snow drought conditions and impacts to the water resources community.

This event is part of the NOAA Drought Seminar Series, a collaborative effort between NOAA Research's Physical Sciences Laboratory, the National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS), and the National Weather Service's Climate Prediction Center. The series aims to enhance NOAA's capability to monitor, predict, and understand drought behavior. Drought is a key part of NOAA Research's science priorities aimed at confronting the challenges of a changing planet. It is also a key focus of National Weather Service operational forecast products and services, supporting stakeholder decision-making and reducing drought-related costs and impacts.

Each session will feature a speaker presentation, a question and answer period with the presenter, and general updates on activities within the drought science and services community. Individual session information, including connection details, is available on the NOAA Drought Seminar Series web page. These seminars will be recorded.

The Physical Sciences Laboratory (PSL) and National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) are part of NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research.

For additional information, please contact Andy Hoell with NOAA Research's Physical Sciences Laboratory.