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Ongoing California Drought May Be Most Severe Since the 16th Century


donsutherland1

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At least that's the argument published in a letter to  Nature Climate Change.

 

Excerpts:

 

California is currently experiencing a record-setting drought that started in 2012 and recently culminated in the first ever mandatory state-wide water restriction1. The snowpack conditions in the Sierra Nevada mountains present an ominous sign of the severity of this drought: the 1 April 2015 snow water equivalent (SWE) was at only 5% of its historical average2. In the Mediterranean climate of California, with 80% of the precipitation occurring during winter months, Sierra Nevada snowpack plays a critical role in replenishing the state's water reservoirs and provides 30% of its water supply3...

 

ur error estimation indicates that there is a possibility that a few (primarily sixteenth century) years exceeded the 2015 low, but the estimated return interval for the 2015 SWE value — as calculated based on a generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution (Supplementary Information) — is 3,100 years and confirms its exceptional character. GEV-estimated return intervals can have large confidence intervals (Supplementary Fig. 2), but the 2015 SWE value exceeds the 95% confidence interval for a 500-year return period (Supplementary Fig. 3). In comparison, the previous lowest SWE reading (in 1977) exceeds the 95% confidence interval for only a 60-year return period. We also find that the 2015 SWE value is strongly exceptional — exceeding the 95% confidence interval for a 1,000-year return period — at low-elevation Sierra Nevada sites where winter temperature has strong control over SWE9, but less so at high-elevation sites, where it exceeds the 95% confidence interval for only a 95-year return period (Supplementary Information and Supplementary Fig. 2).

 

http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/nclimate2809.pdf

 

Hopefully, the ongoing El Niño will initiate a recovery from the ongoing drought.

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Southwest CA has done well recently setting monthly records in some spots for the months of July and now September, normally very dry months. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come.

 

I'm hoping that some of that can spread to Northern California. This is ridiculous how little of their rain has reached our area.

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Jonger, on 28 Sept 2015 - 09:33 AM, said:

Every time I check a 384 hr accumulation map, it's the same story -- nothing on the west coast. It's uncanny how that area of the western hemisphere seems to be exclusively left out of most precipitation. 

 

it's still pretty typical this time of year, going to be a different story if the map looks similar in a couple months

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  • 1 month later...

Has there been a dent in this yet with some of the storms starting up?

 

Building a large and robust snowpack will be key.  Slow melt off in the Spring is the best way to recharge stocks.  Good start, but we are still in the 1st quarter... Need several hundred more inches in the mountains before any kind of dent can be talked about IMO.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Very positive results are coming from the snowpack:

original.jpg

The Northern Sierra is essentially at normal (98%), compared to April 1st of this year (28%).

Central Sierra is doing very well too. Southern Sierra still needs time though. However, it is far better than the snowpack from April 1 (19%).

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  • 2 weeks later...

The drought will soon be over......such is life on the best coast......

 

Not even close.

 

Can't speak for SoCal but here in the Bay Area, the amount of rain we have received so far this rainy season has been about average. Snowpack in the Sierra is also around average (110% of normal). This speaks to how dry the past few years have been.

 

To bust the drought, we need a record-wet rainy season, with records going back to the 1800's.

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