When heavy snow falls, it’s not just a playground for skiers and sledders. It’s also a natural reservoir that provides essential water for drinking, irrigation, and other needs during dry periods. This crucial information has been brought into sharper focus by a new, more comprehensive calculation method developed by researchers at the Oregon State University College of Engineering.
“Water managers typically consider a range of infrastructure options, such as surface water reservoirs and groundwater recharge programs, to balance water supply and demand,” explained David Hill of OSU. “By gaining a better understanding of the water stored in snow, they can make more informed decisions about long-term planning and adjustments to their infrastructure portfolio.”
Professor Hill and doctoral student Christina Aragon conducted a study that analyzed nearly 40 years of snowpack data. Using their new metric, known as snow water storage, they found a 22% decrease in the annual water content of mountain snowpacks in the contiguous United States.
“Unlike other commonly used metrics that focus on snow conditions at a specific point in time or over a specific period, snow water storage can be applied across various time and space scales,” Hill noted. “It’s essentially a cumulative measure, not just a maximum value. It’s like tallying up the total miles you drive in a year, rather than just the distance covered on a single day of a road trip.”
2024-03-17 16:00:04
Source from phys.org