Guest Post by Verity Jones
While the MSM is all hot under the collar about the Killer heat wave in the mid-East US, not a mention about the massive snow accumulation in the Western USA this year. It’s not just a few roads being late to open due to the excessive snow clearance effort (WUWT: here and here), the snowpack is way above average this year. Good news for water supply; bad news for riverside communities.
Just take a look at the extent of this – the Snotel map from 5th June below shows percent of normal snow-water equivalent. The measurements are mostly off the scale, which if you’ll note only goes up to 140% of normal. From the lack of blue and green dots, I’m taking it that the red ones are errors.
- Map from: NRCS Google Earth SNOTEL Data Layer
From mid-May there has been concern in many areas over the amount of snow and the potential for flooding, but instead of melting rapidly the snowpack has persisted, and even continued to accumulate. As of 9th June almost all states listed here (with the exception of Alaska, Arizona and New Mexico, which have much less than normal) are showing vast excesses of snow for the time of year. For example Utah:
And a different format depiction for Wyoming:
Below is yet another way of looking at it – here for the Upper Colorado (link: http://snowpack.water-data.com/uppercolorado/index.php), specifically the feed into Lake Powell. Now this really made me sit up. The levels were ticking along a bit above average until just after mid-April, then they began to rise, and rise, and rise. This says two possible things are happening – either more snow has been falling, and/or temperatures are just not rising enough to melt what is there. Either scenario says ‘cold’.
On 5th June:
“April 15th is the date of maximum snowpack and basinwide snowpack is currently 66.6% of the April 15th average
Snowpack is 277.9% of the June 5th average.”
Of course you just know that when the melt really does get going you just know that all that snow and the ensuing flooding will be blamed on CAGW.
This got me thinking – at what rate does snow melt? I mean we’ve got some truly gargantuan snow drifts in places – how likely is it that significant proportions of them will remain in places that have not retained snow in summer for years?
The last slide in this EPA presentation gives ranges for melt rate with a degree-day factor. The range seems to be 0.07-0.150 inches per day per degree F. These are estimates for a variety of conditions ranging from partially forested/shaded areas to open sun on a prairie. Although some are quite specific, they are still estimates. Now if we take the example of a 22ft drift in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park (Road opens way late due to massive snow) and look up appropriate degree day figures for the region used with this range of melt rate, perhaps we can get an idea of the potential for residual snow pack at the end of the summer.
Using the U. S. degree-day mapping calculator (Coop, L. B. 2010. . Version 4.0. Oregon State University Integrated Plant Protection Center Web Site Publication E.10-04-1: http://uspest.org/cgi-bin/usmapmaker.pl), the following map is for Colorado, calculated between now and the end of September for a 32F base:
Key 
For the higher altitudes we have 1500-2600 degree days before we might expect reasonable additions if not accumulations of snow again, but, still using guestimates for the actual melt rate it seemed sensible to work with a range:
Starting at 264 inches (22 ft) 8th June, the table shows the estimated snow depth remaining on 30th September depending on the assumed melt rate and number of degree days (above 32F). [Update: The table above was produced on the assumption that the melt rates referred to depth of snow. Having covered a lot more background reading on this today I think I should have read the melt rate as “inches SWE/day*F”. Current rates of melting from the NOAA summary table are 0.1-1.6 inches SWE/day. For a 22ft starting snowpack (estimated as 150 inches SWE) my back-of-envelope calculation suggests melt rates would need to be sustained at >1.25 inches SWE/day to remove this depth of snow by the end of September.]
This suggests to me that at higher altitudes there’ll be significant snow ‘left behind’ this year. Those white patches on the distant mountains will be a welcome return for many – cameras at the ready folks!
More than that though, what effect will this have on local/regional temperatures? There would be increased albedo in the mountains where the snow is retained, and potential for cold air drainage as well as depressed river temperatures from prolonged snowmelt over the summer. These effects might be small, and it is, after all, just one unusual year.
Although this is “just weather”, what if we start to have more ‘higher than average’ years now that the PDO has flipped to a cold phase? High pass road opening dates are well documented in Washington State and, having plotted these for the Chinook Pass and North Cascades Highway, I had previously speculated Is the PDO correlated to road openings?
With many analyses suggesting cooler times are on the way, this year may be exceptional in recent experience, but how many “just one year”s would it take for us to notice the effects?
(Updated from post http://diggingintheclay.wordpress.com/2011/06/10/where-snows-dont-melt/)
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
rbateman says:
June 11, 2011 at 1:56 pm
R. Gates says:
June 11, 2011 at 1:15 pm
The waters that fed the La Nina storms over the PNW were BELOW normal SST’s. They were below normal for quite some time, and this warmer is wetter stuff is nothing more than a Warmist contrivance.
It is also the same snowpack as 1982-83 fed by an El Nino.
Proof: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensostuff/ensoyears.shtml
Your theory is wrong, R. Gates, and fails to hold it’s water.
The big snowpack is more a function of the failure of the Sun to warm the Tropics (as seen in UAH data) and drive the Jet Streams back to where they normally resisde, and a like failure to move the stuck weather patterns West to East.
Has nothing at all to do with Antropogenic anything.
_______
I’d rather go with what scientific studies like this show:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2010/2009WR008053.shtml
Rather than listen to your preconceptions. To suggest that a big snow pack in the western U.S. is a result of the “failure of the sun to warm the tropics” is so absurd as to be laughable. During La NIna episodes (and you can put this question to any of your skeptical “experts”on ENSO) the ocean is in fact storing more heat than it is losing, and so there is no “failure of the sun” to warm…if such a thing were possible in any case. Moreover, La Nina patterns create warmer waters in some regions of the Pacific and cooler ones in others, and this is really a function of wind and pressure. It was La Nina that brought the heavy rains to Australia this past season, and that’s because of the abnormally WARM water that was pushed up by the La Nina conditions to the eastern side of Australia. But as the study referenced above clearly shows, it is warmer temperatures of water far out in the Pacific that have a high-degree of influence on how much snow falls in the Upper Colorado River Basin….but if you prefer, you can think it is all caused by the “failure of the sun to warm the tropics”.
During La NIna episodes (and you can put this question to any of your skeptical “experts”on ENSO) the ocean is in fact storing more heat than it is losing
If it’s storing more than it’s losing, it’s clearly on the cooler side.
So, the ocean, as you say, was not involved in putting excess “heat” into the atmosphere to support your warmer air mass theory.
And…It was La Nina that brought the heavy rains to Australia this past season, and that’s because of the abnormally WARM water that was pushed up by the La Nina conditions to the eastern side of Australia.
on the opposite side of the Pacific were the cooler waters that fed the excessive snowpack.
Finally but if you prefer, you can think it is all caused by the “failure of the sun to warm the tropics
I prefer to debate on the merits of the actual data, not somebody elses studies. I can paddle my own boat, thank you.
OK RGates, I get it. Our unusual moisture is climate. Our unusual cold is weather. Just like record breaking hot/cold spells, one needs to know how to assign the blame.
I’m not sure why you claim the MSM has ignored the unusually deep snowpack in the west. I’ve seen several stories and videos about the snowpack, everything from skiing open until the 4th of July in California and Utah, to the flood risk that is still to come.
So is your view biased or did you just not bother to look?
At Mammoth Mountain in California’s Sierra Nevada, there is hope the mountain will stay open for skiing and snowboarding well into August this year. It looks like the top of the mountain should have plenty of snow barring an extended heatwave.
If nothing else, the waterfalls in Yosemite will be spectacular this month – another story being covered by the MSM!
June snow in the UK short before Wimbleton
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-west-wales-13731216
Anyone looking for a nice science fair project? In addition to temperature (and sun angle and wind), I think dew point is a major factor in snow melt rate.
If the dew point is below freezing, then I’ve seen temperatures in the 50s (10-15C) be fairly kind to snow, but if the dew point is above freezing, then water condenses on the snow and most of that latent heat goes into melting snow.
A meteorological truism refers to “snow-eating fog,” but that may have cause and effect backwards. I think it’s a sign that moist air is being cooled by the snow and the water vapor that doesn’t condense on the snow condenses when chilled air mixes with unchilled.
Back in ’97 Yosemite National Park had a “once in 500” year flood event when some late, heavy snows were melted suddenly all at once by a warm spring rain. They had to evacuate Yosemite Valley that time.
This year the snowpack is deep enough to make that flood look like a puppy peeing on a rock. And the melt has only just begun.
Spartan79 says:
June 11, 2011 at 8:59 am
As someone living in Omaha I can tell you we are keeping a very close eye out on the Missouri river, it is way high at the moment and yes we are talking about what will happen when the snow melts
University of Washington research shows Cool PDO + La Nina = 26% more snowpack.
http://cses.washington.edu/cig/pnwc/clvariability.shtml
@Bill Jamison
“So is your view biased or did you just not bother to look?”
As I am in the UK, my view is very definately biased to what I pick up as major stories in the MSM. News in the UK (unlike the US in my experience) has a high proportion of international news, and much of our media seems biased – the ‘warm’ stories get through.
Talk about hockey sticks. :p
[I posted the following in Tips and Notes yesterday, but it seems apropos here, raising the old weather vs. climate question, among other issues.]
I found myself listening to NPR this morning, and lo and behold! Here’s a report on a new historical study of snowpack in the Rockies, a favorite topic here on WUWT. What have they discovered, by the magic of tree rings? Twentieth-century global warming!
http://www.npr.org/2011/06/10/137088287/thinning-snows-in-rockies-tied-to-global-warming
/Mr Lynn
either more snow has been falling, and/or temperatures are just not rising enough to melt what is there. Either scenario says ‘cold’.
———-
So is this conclusion based on the ever popular around here ” snow is not water vapor, it’s crystallized cold” theory. Are in fact these record snows accompanied by record cold temperatures?
I am betting not since, for example, during the ice ages conditions were very dry and snow accumulation rates were slow.
Here’s an interesting site to watch as the melt season progresses:
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/crh/?n=mo-river-flooding-2011
I was hacking around the internet looking for information on U.S. aquifers. This spring the reservoirs in the west are filling up, rivers are swelling and flooding, and I can’t help but wonder where all the water goes besides downstream and eventually to the sea. When we have a wet year like this, does the water find it’s way into the aquifers? I am not versed at all in geology or hydrology but I live in a parched, dry state (Arizona) and just wonder if all this water goes somewhere underground.
For those of you who appreciate the wonderful blinkers worn by the CAGW crowd who can spot a rising trend a mile away but are blind to falling trends, enjoy the biting comments by Lubos Motl:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2011/06/rss-amsu-all-cooling-and-warming-trends.html
Dennis Cox says:
June 11, 2011 at 4:20 pm
Back in ’97 Yosemite National Park had a “once in 500″ year flood event when some late, heavy snows were melted suddenly all at once by a warm spring rain. They had to evacuate Yosemite Valley that time.
The record snowpack is an accident looking for a place to happen, with full reservoirs up & down the state. Not to mention the entire PNW + Northern Rockies, Northern Plains. For whom the sudden melting tolls?
Mr Lynn says:
June 11, 2011 at 5:49 pm
Take in a few of the 2,000 year or 1,000 year tree-ring studies available for the PNW or Rockies.
You’ll find great variety in the wild swings to extremes. You’ll also find those wild fluctuations occuring in the cool periods as well as the warm periods. For every year of drought, there’s a year of flood.
It’s proof of natural variations. We have witnessed but a small portion of what nature can serve up in our puny 160 years out West.
Oh, the amplitude of it all !!
R. Gates,
I asked you to stop it, not to amplify it to 1000 dB.
Global temperatures were down this spring, it wasn’t a “local” Western US phenomenon.
As they were down during the last 10 years.
Your case is closed, you just don’t want to believe it.
Alexander Feht says:
June 11, 2011 at 8:49 pm
R. Gates,
I asked you to stop it, not to amplify it to 1000 dB.
Global temperatures were down this spring, it wasn’t a “local” Western US phenomenon.
As they were down during the last 10 years.
Your case is closed, you just don’t want to believe it.
——–
? I Should believe you over the data? With the notable exception of parts of the western and northwesten U.S. and the northern part of Ausfralia, the planet has been generally pretty warm these past few months. Sorry you can’t grasp what the scientific literature is telling you…but higher precipitation rates are associated with warmer, not cooler water, and the storms that bring moisture to many parts of the west are not associated with the local temperatures at all, but are dictated by sea surface temps far out in the Pacific…at least that’s what the research tells us…but who needs research anyway?
The only interesting question now –
Is this just a normal part of the 60 year cycle, with climate just entering the cooler half?
OR
Is there a real change in the sunspot cycle which will bring a new little ice age?
Happy times either way – I do hate the cold even more than the heat.
Dennis Cox says:
June 11, 2011 at 4:20 pm
Back in ’97 Yosemite National Park had a “once in 500″ year flood event when some late, heavy snows were melted suddenly all at once by a warm spring rain. They had to evacuate Yosemite Valley that time.”
The 97 flood was January 1st, not late at all. It was however a warm southern storm, pineapple express.
@Dennis Cox
The record flood in Yosemite was in January 1997. It was due to heavy snows that fell in late December being rapidly melted by the warm rains that raised snow levels up over 10,000 feet. I got stuck up at Lake Tahoe in the same floods and it is definitely an experience I’ll never forget. One of the disc jockeys for a Lake Tahoe radio station played “Flood” by Jars of Clay immediately following the Emergency Broadcast System alert. I thought it was funny, not sure if other people did. It took me two days to get out of Lake Tahoe and back to the SF Bay area due to roads being closed. What a mess!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Merced_River_flood
@R. Gates, its not just northern Australia that’s colder than normal, just take a look at the Aus BOM’s version of the last 3 months and about 90% has been colder than the 61-90 mean, and its about the same for the last 6 months BTW. And don’t we know it, it’s bl**dy freezing down here! That’s a pretty convoluted map of warm and cold areas you found there.
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/awap/temp/index.jsp?colour=colour&time=latest&step=0&map=meananom&period=3month&area=nat
I don’t agree with you, Gates. I do agree with Pamela that higher evaporation rates result from choppy oceans created by higher wind. Sharpened temperature gradients create that wind. This was the strongest La Nina in 50 years of satellite observation so changing the wind spawning temperature gradients. The stratosphere volcano eruptions near the polar regions with stratosphere eruptions lacking elsewhere will sharpen the gradients and create windy conditions, made the La Nina imho.
R. Gates,
Did you say you live in the front range, CO? Turn to the West (where the sun goes down) and look at the snow. Go to Lookout Rd., south of Niwot, facing west and find the bowl that has not melted off for four years. I have pictures. Why don’t you know this?
I haven’t been able to can tomatoes for four years as the yields are so small. Why? Not hot enough and too much wind. Five years ago, I canned a gazillion quarts and supplied all my neighbors with fresh tomatoes. I’m getting great raspberry crops though 🙂 The cooler temps have prevented the spinach and lettuce from going to flower but the leaves are tough, thick and damaged by wind. I’m hoping to do better this year.
These are things I can understand. I don’t understand your abstract and therefore, I’m not interested in buying the report as I expect I wouldn’t understand it either. What is a Singular Value Decomposition (SVD)? Your global map shows global temps that fall in the lower range and higher range as compared to a 29 year base period (1969-1990). I don’t understand why a very short base period ending 21 years ago is used. I guess it makes the map color up they way AGW businesses like to see it.
I know that submissions to AGU are plentiful. I don’t understand why the abstract lists the authors names and schools but not their credentials. Are they students? Yes, I’m ignorant. I’ve never heard of the IRI, who describe themselves thusly: “We use a science-based approach to enhance society’s capability to understand, anticipate and manage the impacts of climate in order to improve human welfare and the environment, especially in developing countries”. Is this a good resource for climate change information?
If you wish to convince those who pay the bills (that would be me, for one) and vote, please don’t present abstracts and graphs without saying what makes the authors experts and why you believe their results are valid. Try to remember that most citizens have their hands full doing what they do and can’t become experts at everything. If you want to baffle with bs, as it appears you do, mission accomplished.