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A New Estimate of North American Mountain Snow Accumulation From Regional Climate Model Simulations
Author(s) -
Wrzesien Melissa L.,
Durand Michael T.,
Pavelsky Tamlin M.,
Kapnick Sarah B.,
Zhang Yu,
Guo Junyi,
Shum C. K.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1002/2017gl076664
Subject(s) - snowpack , snow , mountain range (options) , water equivalent , climatology , climate model , range (aeronautics) , physical geography , environmental science , climate change , geology , meteorology , geography , oceanography , materials science , financial economics , economics , composite material
Despite the importance of mountain snowpack to understanding the water and energy cycles in North America's montane regions, no reliable mountain snow climatology exists for the entire continent. We present a new estimate of mountain snow water equivalent (SWE) for North America from regional climate model simulations. Climatological peak SWE in North America mountains is 1,006 km 3 , 2.94 times larger than previous estimates from reanalyses. By combining this mountain SWE value with the best available global product in nonmountain areas, we estimate peak North America SWE of 1,684 km 3 , 55% greater than previous estimates. In our simulations, the date of maximum SWE varies widely by mountain range, from early March to mid‐April. Though mountains comprise 24% of the continent's land area, we estimate that they contain ~60% of North American SWE. This new estimate is a suitable benchmark for continental‐ and global‐scale water and energy budget studies.