Abstract
2005: Effects of temperature and precipitation variability on snowpack trends in the western U.S., Journal of Climate, 18 (21): 4545–4561.
Hamlet, A.F., Mote, P.W, Clark, M.P., Lettenmaier, D.P.
Recent studies have shown substantial declines in snow water equivalent (SWE) over much of the western US in the last half century, as well as trends towards earlier spring snowmelt and peak spring streamflows. These trends are influenced both by interannual and decadal scale climate variability, and also by temperature trends at longer time scales that are generally consistent with observations of global warming over the 20th century.
In this study we examine linear trends in April 1 snow water equivalent (SWE) over the western US as simulated by the Variable Infiltration Capacity hydrologic model implemented at 1/8 degree latitude-longitude spatial resolution, and driven by a carefully quality controlled gridded daily precipitation and temperature data set for the period 1915–2003. The long simulations of snowpack are used as surrogates for observations, and are the basis for an analysis of regional trends in snowpack over the western U.S. and southern British Columbia.
By isolating the trends due to temperature and precipitation in separate simulations, the influence of temperature and precipitation variability on the overall trends in SWE is evaluated. Downward trends in April 1 SWE over the western U.S. from 1916 to 2003, 1947–2003, and for a time series constructed using two warm Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) epochs concatenated together, are shown to be primarily due to widespread warming. These temperature-related trends are not well explained by decadal climate variability associated with the PDO. Trends in SWE associated with precipitation trends, however, are very different in different time periods and are apparently largely controlled by decadal variability rather than longer term trends in climate.