Tracking Drought in Alaska: Developing New Indicators and Tools

Although Alaska is often thought of as a water-rich state, drought can have significant impacts on communities, ecosystems, hydropower generation, subsistence resources, agriculture, wildfire, and water supplies. In this webinar, Charlie Parr, UAF Scenarios Network for Alaska and Arctic Planning (SNAP), and Rick Thoman, Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Preparedness, will introduce a new set of drought indicators developed for Alaska using ERA5-Land, a global climate dataset that combines weather observations with computer models to provide consistent estimates of historical weather and land surface conditions. They will discuss how the indicators are generated using a repeatable process that allows them to be updated regularly over time, their strengths and limitations, and how they can support environmental monitoring and decision-making. They will also invite feedback from participants to help improve these tools and ensure they meet the needs of Alaska communities, resource managers, and other users.

This work was supported by NOAA's National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) and National Weather Service.

Speakers:

• Charlie Parr, University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Scenarios Network for Alaska and Arctic Planning (SNAP)
• Rick Thoman, Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Preparedness