Drought this spring has increased significantly across our region, with some states already hitting the highest levels.
Swaths of several states are considered under “extreme” drought conditions, including parts of Utah and Colorado. And, regions in Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico get the worst rating. They’re considered to be in an “exceptional” drought.
David Simeral is a climatologist with the Western Regional Climate Center under the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), who works on the U.S. Drought Monitor, an interactive map that shows higher levels of drought than it did at this point a year ago.
“This means that a dry winter with a shallow snow pack that’s melted quickly, that there’s not going to be much of any recovery that’s going to occur in those big reservoir systems,” said Simeral.
For example, there’s a lack of snowpack across the Rocky Mountains.
“Because of warming temperatures, that snowpack is going to be concentrated in higher elevations and it’s not gonna have the same amount of spatcial areal extent of coverage in the winter,” he said.
That means the rain and snow line is receding to higher elevations, and that in turn, means less water flows downstream.
Ultimately, Simeral said the dry conditions will hit reservoirs hard, leaving less water available.
In preparation for parched summer months, governors across the Mountain West have already announced various plans to prevent wildfires. Governors’ recommendations range from urging people to clear dead brush now from their homes to budgetary efforts to ensure wildfire suppression funds are available.
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio (KNPR) in Las Vegas, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Colorado and KANW in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
