New Mexico’s 2012 weather feels increasingly like a teachable moment, though the lessons must be handled with care. As the folks in the local media-weather complex went into stormpocalypse mode over the possibility that it might actually snow this weekend, I took pause in Saturday’s paper to look back: The storm comes as New Mexico …
We’ve not had much opportunity of late to measure snow here in Albuquerque, so I had to snag this picture from some time ago. But it’s that time of year when thoughts of weather nerds turn to the snow in their backyards, which offers me another chance to flog my book, which would be a …
Richard Seager’s widely cited 2007 paper projecting “an Imminent Transition to a More Arid Climate in Southwestern North America” did not use the Palmer Drought Severity Index. His work relies on a calculation of precipitation minus evaporation (P – E) to determine the extent and trend of drying under a changing climate. In response to …
Continue reading ‘measuring drought – the right tool for the job’ »
From the morning paper, an exploration of what we mean by “drought”, with some stuff on the Sheffield Nature paper so talked recently in drought circles, along with the latest grim outlook: “Drought,” University of Arizona research Gregg Garfin said, “is defined by its impacts.” I realize this is a long-winded way of being very …
Continue reading ‘stuff I wrote elsewhere: “Depends on what you mean by ‘drought.’”’ »
From the work blog, some material from a discussion among drought researchers on the Sheffield Nature paper and the question of when the Palmer Drought Severity Index is or isn’t the right tool for the drought measurement job. Here’s Dave Gutzler: Despite its many limitations PDSI is still a meaningful indicator of short term climate …
Continue reading ‘Stuff I wrote elsewhere: on drought metrics’ »
The Sheffield et al drought paper in Nature that I blogged quickly about a couple of days ago has triggered all kinds of fascinating discussion among folks in the southwestern US “drought community” (yes, there is such a thing). In brief, Sheffield and colleagues argue that a careful application of the Palmer Drought Severity Index suggests …
Continue reading ‘So what exactly do we mean by “drought”?’ »
A new paper in today’s Nature by Justin Sheffield and colleagues suggests we’ve been using simplistic calculations that have overestimated the increase in drought globally over the last 60 years in response to greenhouse warming. Scientists typically use the Palmer Drought Severity Index, a bit a statistical black box that bases its drought estimate on …
Continue reading ‘Some good news today on climate change: less drought than we thought’ »
If you needed another prod to sign up as a CoCoRaHS weather observer, now you can get PRISM data for your own neighborhood. I’ve got 13 years of precip data for my house, first as part of the Albuquerque National Weather Service’s CityNet program, and now as a CoCoRaHS observer. But 13 years is too short …
Continue reading ‘Heineman-Fleck house monthly climate report, now with new improved PRISM data’ »
I’ve always known, in very general terms, that the tumbleweed is an interloper. But the story is better than I could possibly have hoped. From Tim Egan’s The Worst Hard Time (a book I’m just catching up with and wondering what took me so long): [W]hen they boarded ships for America, the Germans from Russia …
Continue reading ‘Russian thistle and the American heartland’ »
On a quick weekend dash to Ogden earlier this month, I squeezed an hour out of my return trip to the Salt Lake City airport to make the drive out the causeway across the Great Salt Lake to Antelope Island. When G.K. Gilbert, under the direction of John Wesley Powell, was trying to sort out …
Continue reading ‘Antelope Island and the notion of climate variability’ »