Recent studies done by the University of Colorado have shown that climate warming is resulting in slower snow-melts, and this could negatively impact the amount of water reaching reservoirs that are used as a water source for drinking water and agricultural purposes.
One would think that the warming climate and earlier snowmelt would actually result in more water flowing into the reservoirs more quickly, and to find that the exact opposite is happening is a bit of a conundrum, but according to a paper published in AGU publications Geophysical Research Letters in July, this is what is happening.
“As the climate warms, there is actually a slower snowmelt — both in timing and rates, which makes for a less efficient streamflow,” said Adrian Harpold, ecohydrologist at the University of Nevada, Reno. Harpold, who initiated the study two years ago at the University of Colorado Boulder, is a co-author of the paper. His Nevada Mountain Ecohydrology Lab is based in the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and Natural Resources.
Researchers studied the effects of slower snowmelt in various regions of the United States, including the Sierra Nevada range, the Rocky Mountains, the Cascade Range, and the Wasatch Range, and while the streamflow from Colorado’s Rocky Mountains is most sensitive to a change in snowmelt, analysts predict that all the ranges will be equally affected in the future.
“I know, it’s counterintuitive, but with a warming climate snowmelt starts sooner in the season, and at a slower rate because the warming occurs earlier when days are shorter and we have less sunlight,” he said. “What makes runoff less efficient is that slower snowmelt reduces the amount of moisture being pushed deep into the subsurface where it is less likely to evaporate” (Source: University of Nevada, Reno]
According to Noah Molotch the director of the Center for Water Earth Science & Technology CWEST in the CU Boulder Department of Geography and also a co-author of the paper, 60 million people depend on the snowmelt for their water supply and any future decline in the rate of streamflow from the snowmelts will result in additional stress being placed on already over-stressed water supplies.
Get bottled water cooler and mains water cooler from Living-Water.
