Sentences with phrase «as snowmelt»

That's when reservoirs are full with storm runoff and dam operators must release water as snowmelt builds.

The winter snowpack in mountainous regions such as the Himalayas, the Rockies, the Sierra, and the Andes is a most efficient reservoir, storing water through the cold months and releasing it gradually as snowmelt in warm months when farmers need it.

Like many mountain ecosystems, Niwot Ridge serves as an important «water tower,» regulating downhill water flow as snowmelt replenishes lakes and streams at lower elevations.

Not exact matches

Due to deficiencies in the sewer collection system and lack of treatment capacity, wet weather events such as rain or snowmelt generate more wastewater than the plant can handle.

Birch trees not performing as expected That means a shorter period for snow to accumulate in winter and a bigger gap between snowmelt and summer rains, two factors that work together to produce more intense dry spells.

«The timing of snowmelt and length of the snow - free season significantly impacts weather, the permafrost, and wildlife — in short, the Arctic terrestrial system as a whole,» said Christopher Cox, a scientist with CIRES at the University of Colorado Boulder and NOAA's Physical Sciences Division in Boulder, Colorado.

«As we reach a tipping point and see our customary water storage system, the snowpack, melting more and earlier in the winter, systems that rely on snowmelt will need to be reevaluated and modified.»

As temperatures are warming, that snowmelt is happening earlier and earlier.

The trends driven by earlier snowmelt are likely to as they are «are very much in line with the projections of future climate» from climate models, study co-author Berit Arheimer of the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute said.

The UW researchers acknowledge that temperature is a very broad predictor of snowmelt behavior, yet they expect their theory to hold true as they look more closely at the relationship between climate and snowmelt throughout the Pacific Northwest.

«Since the precipitation is likely to fall as snow this could mean either earlier or later timing of snowmelt.»

A slower melting rate will reduce water availability both for human consumption and for ecosystems that rely on snowmelt, such as the mountains in the western US.

Concentrations in the groundwater were typically at least one order of magnitude lower than the concentrations in the treatment plant effluent, suggesting that the soil generally acted as an effective biogeochemical filter, except during snowmelt events.

In baseline scenarios, without any temperature alteration, the streams behaved as expected, with a swell in streamflow during snowmelt.

Stone, R.S., E.G. Dutton, J.M. Harris, and D. Longnecker, 2002: Earlier spring snowmelt in northern Alaska as an indicator of climate change.

As the title suggests, it mainly deals with the projected decline of snow cover rather than of glaciers, and it does say that «approximately one - sixth of the world's population lives within this snowmelt - dominated, low - reservoir - storage domain».

High - frequency associations (not shown here) remain strong throughout the whole record, but average density levels have continuously fallen while temperatures in recent decades have risen... As yet, the reason is not known, but analyses of time - dependent regional comparisons suggest that it is associated with a tendency towards loss of «spring» growth response (Briffa et al., 1 999b) and, at least for subarctic Siberia, it may be connected with changes in the timing of spring snowmelt (Vaganov et al., 1999).

Snowfall varies across the region, comprising less than 10 % of total precipitation in the south, to more than half in the north, with as much as two inches of water available in the snowpack at the beginning of spring melt in the northern reaches of the river basins.81 When this amount of snowmelt is combined with heavy rainfall, the resulting flooding can be widespread and catastrophic (see «Cedar Rapids: A Tale of Vulnerability and Response»).82 Historical observations indicate declines in the frequency of high magnitude snowfall years over much of the Midwest, 83 but an increase in lake effect snowfall.61 These divergent trends and their inverse relationships with air temperatures make overall projections of regional impacts of the associated snowmelt extremely difficult.

Along its route, the river passes through an elaborate water - management system designed to tame the yearly floods from spring snowmelt and to provide a reliable supply of water for residents as far away as California.

You can see this illustrated in the charts below, which show the timing of floods (green lines) as well as the peaks of each of their drivers — rainfall (purple), orange (snowmelt) and soil moisture (blue)-- for six flooding «hotspots» in Europe.

Riverine flooding depends on precipitation as well as many other factors, such as existing soil moisture conditions and snowmelt.

(A) mitigate the destructive impacts of climate - related increases in the duration, frequency, or magnitude of rainfall or runoff, including snowmelt runoff, as well as hurricanes;

Two articles recently published in the peer reviewed literature examine how the rate of snowmelt may change as the Earth's climate changes, and how droughts can evolve and move over time.

This newsletter discusses the publishing of rivers climate change indicators for the British Columbia (BC) Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy, engineering design values for Island Health, progress on the development of the Climate Tool for Engineers, new partnerships with the Blueberry Council of BC and the Comox Valley Regional District, a paper on projected changes to summer mean wet bulb globe temperatures led by Chao Li, a Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society article on extreme wildfire risk in the Fort McMurray area by Megan Kirchmeier - Young, a staff profile on Dr. Gildas Dayon, the PCIC Climate Seminar Series, a welcome to doctoral student Yaheng Tan, the release of PCIC's 2016 - 2017 Corporate Report, the release of a Science Brief on snowmelt and drought, the publishing of Climate Change Projections for the Cowichan Valley Regional District and State of the Physical, Biological and Selected Fishery Resources of Pacific Canadian Marine Ecosystems in 2016, as well as peer - reviewed publications since the last newsletter.

Runoff from snowmelt is regarded as a vital water source for people and ecosystems throughout the Northern Hemisphere (NH).

Snowmelt - driven flooding in Yosemite Valley and parts of Mariposa County is about to worsen as new thunderstorms packing 50 - mile - per - hour winds slam the Sierra Mountains.

Species that live downslope will also be hurt by changes on mountaintops; the Sierra Nevada mountain yellow - legged frog, for example, depends on runoff from snowpack year - round to support its three - to four - year life stage as a tadpole, and earlier spring snowmelt runoff caused by global warming may leave this hardy, once - abundant creature high and dry in the summertime.

Water resources, already over-tapped in many areas, will become even scarcer as a result of increased evaporation and snowmelt caused by higher temperatures, affecting agriculture, hydroelectric power plants, and water availability in growing cities such as Phoenix and Las Vegas.

In particular, more winter and spring flooding and drier summers are expected as well as less winter snow (more rain) and earlier snowmelt.

Seasonal drought risk is also projected to increase in summer and fall as higher temperatures lead to greater evaporation and earlier winter and spring snowmelt.11

California's water systems are built to hold snowmelt as it is slowly released from mountain snowpack.

Because of its cold - adapted features and rapid warming, climate change impacts on Alaska are already pronounced, including earlier spring snowmelt, reduced sea ice, widespread glacier retreat, warmer permafrost, drier landscapes, and more extensive insect outbreaks and wildfire, as described below.

«As the climate warms up, now what we see is even when there is a pretty good snowpack, like we had last year, we don't get enough snowmelt runoff to make a huge impact on [Elephant Butte] reservoir,» which is the main area of storage for the Upper Rio Grande.

The ensemble mean of the MMD models projects a general decrease in snow depth (Chapter 10) as a result of delayed autumn snowfall and earlier spring snowmelt.

«What we found looking at those two in this region, is that it was actually dust that controlled snowmelt timing and magnitude and sort of how fast snow ran out of the mountains, as opposed to temperature,» Skiles said.

Sometimes, heavy rains, coupled with snowmelts, can cause the Ohio River to overflow its banks and flood this area, as many residents remember happening in 2011.

Policyholders in over 22,000 communities across the country depend on the NFIP to protect homes and businesses from torrential rain, swollen rivers and lakes, snowmelt, failing infrastructure, as well as storm surges and hurricanes.