Checking in on California Water, Snow Levels
We are now midway through our typical water year when it comes to rain and Sierra snow.
Tag Archive for: dry january
Lake Shasta Waters Rise During Atmospheric River. Here’s How Full Reservoir Is
Lake Shasta waters lapped 30 feet from its top after an atmospheric river dropped more than 8 inches of rain in the Redding area since last Friday — and a new storm is expected to bring more rain to the region.
California State Water Project Increases Allocations Despite Dry January Weather
Allocations from California’s State Water Project continue to slowly trend upwards this winter, with water managers announcing a 5 percent increase in requested deliveries compared to last month.
Slo County Had Driest January and February in More Than 150 Years — Is This the ‘New Normal’?
After reviewing 153 years of rainfall records from Cal Poly’s Irrigation Training & Research Center, there has never been a back-to-back dry January followed by a parched February in San Luis Obispo County. Over the many decades of rain data, if you saw a primarily dry January, it would be followed by a wet February and vice versa during the peak of our rainy season (July 1 through June 30).
Read more at: https://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/weather/weather-watch/article258890608.html#storylink=cpy
What Is the Future of Snow? Grappling With Climate Change and Warmer Winters
Between the Winter Olympics and our dry January, I’ve been thinking a lot about snow over the last few weeks. Last month, Reno saw no measurable precipitation for the first time since such records were kept. The dry streak has continued past January. And although there have been longer periods of dryness in the region, it’s enough to be noticeable, matched with warm temperatures that make it feel more like spring than winter.
Maybe it’s the weather whiplash that makes it feel especially noticeable. The water year started out strong.
Record Temperatures Forecast as Winter Heatwave Heads for California
An unusual winter heatwave is expected across California this week with record temperatures in the forecast for multiple cities from the San Francisco Bay Area to Los Angeles.
In Southern California, where temperatures are predicted to be 15 to 20 degrees above normal from Wednesday morning through Sunday, the National Weather Service upgraded a heat watch to a heat advisory.
The heat watch and advisory were the first to be issued by the Los Angeles weather office in the month of February, according to records dating to 2006. Most heat watches and warnings in the area are issued from May through October.
Charts Show Where California Reservoir Levels Stand After Weeks of Dry Weather
A dry January with little rainfall across much of Northern California actually didn’t hurt the state’s water storage levels, according to data from the California Department of Water Resources.
In fact, thanks to a little snowmelt, water levels were up for all reservoirs from December to January. Lake Mendocino, which has a capacity of 122,400 acre feet, saw the biggest boost from 17% of storage capacity in December to 35% in January. One acre foot is the equivalent of one acre of land covered in one foot of water. Trinity Lake, with a capacity of 2,447,650 acre feet, had the smallest increase from 29% in December to 30% in January.
The Colorado River Basin’s Water Forecast Looked Good in January. Now Everything Has Changed.
The past 30 days have at least temporarily erased hopes of above-average spring runoff in the Colorado River Basin, according to the February report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Colorado Basin River Forecast Center.
“Very little precipitation during the last three weeks of January, especially across southern Utah and southwest Colorado,” Cody Moser, a hydrologist with the NOAA forecast center, said Monday during a web briefing to review the agency’s latest monthly water-supply report.
The National Resources Conservation Service maintains snow telemetry (SNOTEL) sites across the Colorado River Basin, which automatically report snow depth and quality. Beginning in December, NOAA produces regular reports based on the SNOTEL data, detailing how that snow might translate into streamflow come spring.
A Record Dry January in Some Spots, With No Precipitation Currently on Horizon for First Half of February
Well, I don’t need to tell most folks twice: January 2022 was an exceptionally dry month across most of California and Nevada. Some spots saw a bit of rain and snow during the first couple days of the month, but others saw nothing at all; the last 25 days of the month brought essentially zero precipitation to the entire region. As a result, January 2022 will go down in the record books as the driest January on record (since at least 1895) for most of the San Joaquin Valley, the Central and Southern Sierra, and pockets of the Sacramento Valley and western Nevada.
Due to the clear and dry conditions, temperatures were (on average) warmer than usual for January, but with a wide diurnal spread: overnight minimum temperatures were actually slightly *colder* than usual, but daytime high temperatures were significantly above average (and, thus, won out on in the monthly average).
Dry January Takes a Toll on Promising Start to Water Year
The second manual snow survey for the current water year demonstrated the impact that dry conditions in January have had on California’s snowpack. The Department of Water Resources (DWR) conducted the survey at Phillips Station earlier in the week. While the measurements were relatively strong, there is still concern for the rest of the season as statewide water storage levels sit at about 76 percent of average.
“For our survey today, we recorded a snow depth of 48.5 inches and a snow water content of 19 inches. That results in 109 percent of average to date and 78 percent of the April 1 average here at this location,” said Sean de Guzman, Manager of DWR’s Snow Surveys and Water Supply Forecasting Unit. “That one dry month of January basically wiped out whatever head start we had as we head towards the end of winter. We still have about two more months to build up our snowpack, but we all need to be prepared for a third consecutive dry year.”
