southwest region climate in summer
This chapter builds on assessments of climate change in the Southwest region from the three previous U.S. National Climate Assessments. Arizona's highest elevations receive an average of 65 to 76 centimeters (25 to 30 inches), with lower areas in the states southwestern portion averaging less than 8 centimeters (3 inches). The Southwest relies on the slow melt of mountain snowpack throughout the spring and summer, when water demands are highest. An increased frost-free season length also leads to increased water demands for agriculture and heat stress on plants. This movement of air in different directions is also the reason for the high incidence of powerful tornados that occur along "Tornado Alley" in the Great Plains, which affect eastern New Mexico and especially eastern Colorado. Sprawling development of Phoenix, Arizona, a city in the Sonoran Desert, 2009. Higher atmospheric moisture content has also been correlated with an increased incidence of tornados and winter storms. Winter is the driest season in New Mexico, because precipitation from eastward-traveling Pacific storms is left behind in the western mountains of Arizona and Utah. Approximately 3.5 million years ago, glacial ice began to form over the Arctic Ocean and on the northern parts of North America and Eurasia. Mesohippusmeasured up to 70 centimeters (2 feet) at shoulder height. All the weather intel you need for summer 2021 is here -- including what's in store for wildfire season . Some earlier studies suggested that El Nio may be related to lower JulyAugust rainfall, and La Nia related to higher rainfall, due to large-scale atmospheric circulation changes. Pleistocene Lake Bonneville. Indeed, much of this region has low annual rainfall and seasonally high temperatures that contribute to its characteristic desert climate. SUMMARY OF THE OUTLOOK FOR NON-TECHNICAL USERS. By the end of the Cretaceous, uplift to the west was great enough that the resulting hills shed large amounts of sand and gravel in an easterly direction, pushing the shoreline eastward until sediment (combined with a worldwide drop in sea level) filled the area formerly occupied by the Western Interior Seaway. Pangaea began to break up during the Jurassic, rifting apart into continents that would drift toward their modern-day positions. It's made up of the states of Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas. The ENSO blog is written, edited, and moderated by Michelle LHeureux (NOAA Climate Prediction Center), Emily Becker (University of Miami/CIMAS), Nat Johnson (NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory), and Tom DiLiberto and Rebecca Lindsey (contractors to NOAA Climate Program Office), with periodic guest contributors. In a broad sense, the Southwests climate is mostly dry and hot, with much of the region characterized as arid. Columbian mammoth (Mammuthus columbi) tracks, Pleistocene, White Sands National Park, New Mexico. Dark gray is land, white and light gray are submerged areas. The Southwest Region climate in the United States is often associated with extremes. By 2070, one can expect up to 38 more days of freeze-free weather each year. Layers of gypsum, an evaporate, from the Permian Castile Formation, Eddy County, New Mexico. In southern New Mexico and Arizona, shallow marine deposits, laid down when the ice in Gondwana retreated and sea level rose, alternate with layers of dust blown in when the ice in Gondwana advanced and sea level fell. At the close of the Mesozoic, global climatealthough warmer than todaywas cooler than at the start of the era. P. Natl. The daily range between maximum and minimum temperatures sometimes runs as much as 50 to 60 degrees F during the drier periods of the year. The pyrocumulonimbus cloud shown at the arrow was created by heat from the fire. Page snapshot:Introduction to the climate of the southwestern United States, including present, past, and future climate. Photo by James St. John (flickr, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license). For example, high winter temperatures between 2000 and 2003 correlated to bark beetle outbreaks that devastated pinyon pine throughout the Southwest, leading to nearly 90% mortality at some sites in Colorado and Arizona. Extreme high temperatures. Reconstruction created using basemap from thePALEOMAP PaleoAtlas for GPlatesand the PaleoData Plotter Program, PALEOMAP Project by C. R. Scotese (2016); map annotations by Jonathan R. Hendricks and Elizabeth J. Hermsen for PRI's[emailprotected]project (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0license). When you take an already highly variable phenomenon like rainfall, add in uncertain regional climate change impacts, and factor in the sparse data record, it gets difficult to make a strong case about exactly how the monsoon rainfall is changing. Fall- The fall in the Southwest region is warm. All rights reserved. While most of the evidence for cooling at the Eocene-Oligocene boundary comes from the deep sea, fossil mammals in the Rocky Mountains show clear evidence of a change from forests to grasslands, which is associated with global cooling. Glaciation in the Southern Hemisphere occurred during the late Devonian, while the supercontinent Gondwana was located over the South Pole, and intensified during the early Carboniferous. Photo by Santa Fe National Forest (National Interagency Fire Center on flickr, public domain). In the podcast episode 2021a generational monsoon? Zack listed some of the factors that influence how much moisture is available to the monsoon, including the position of the high-pressure area, wind patterns, and transient weather features. The warmest temperatures in the Southwest are found in Arizona and New Mexico, while the coolest are found in Utah and Colorado. The cities of Aspen and Lafayette, Colorado, as well as the state of New Mexico, were early adopters of the 2030 Challenge, an effort to reduce fossil fuel use in buildings so that both new and renovated buildings would qualify as carbon neutral by the year 2030. JavaScript appears to be disabled on this computer. The Southwest, already the driest region in the United States, has become even drier since the mid-20th century, particularly on the hottest days . Climate.gov image of original from Albuquerque, NM National Weather Service office. Go to the full list of resources about the climate of the southwestern U.S. Go to the full list of general resources about climate. Shallow seas invaded the continent, ultimately covering the whole area until the late Carboniferous. Both fires began as prescribed burns, or fires that were set deliberately with the intention of preventing the formation of future wildfires. . The monsoon starts to develop in Mexico in June, and moves into the U.S. Southwest in July. Photo of USNM 166396 from the Cretaceous Atlas of Ancient Life(Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license, image cropped). Global temperatures during the Cretaceous were very warm, as much as 10C (18F) above those at present. In 2020, Colorado ranked 7th in the nation for solar and wind power production, and Arizona and New Mexico ranked 12th and 13th, respectively. At this time, the Southwest was still submerged. The Southwest has a very unique culture, climate, and geography. Resilient Bermudagrass is widely used in the region, but sufficient watering is essential in the desert climate . The first letter of each zone in the key indicates its major classification. Because warm air can hold more moisture than cool air can, convective mixing with cool air forces moisture to condense out of warm air as vapor (clouds) and precipitation. (2019)Biology Letters15: 20190114(Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license, images cropped, reconfigured, resized, and relabeled). Weather conditions, particularly hot, dry weather and wind that spreads flames, contribute significantly to the ignition and growth of wildfires. Scale bar = 5 centimeters (about 2 inches). February 2023 ENSO update: the ENSO Blog investigates, part 3, How the pattern of trends across the tropical Pacific Ocean is critical for understanding the future climate, January 2023 La Nia update, and the ENSO Blog investigates, part 2, Albuquerque, NM National Weather Service office, ENSO does influence Pacific tropical storms, Tucson recorded its wettest month ever this July, Monsoon causes deadly flash flood in Arizona, Images of CO2 emissions and transport from the Vulcan project, TreeFlow: Streamflow Reconstructions from Tree Rings. 2010. The size and location of various lakes in which the Green River Formation sediments were deposited during the Eocene epoch. Arizona's climate is influenced by three main topographical areas: the high Colorado Plateau (about 15202130 meters or 50007000 feet in elevation), the rugged mountains to the west (27403660 meters or 900012000 feet high), and the low southwestern mountains with desert valleys (as low as 30 meters or 100 feet above sea level). Map made by Elizabeth J. Hermsen usingSimplemapprand modified in Photoshop. The impacts of the monsoon go beyond just rainfall amounts. Photos of YPM IP 529539 by Jessica Utrup, 2015 (Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History/YPM,CC0 1.0 Universal/Public Domain Dedication, viaGBIF.org). The average amount of precipitation for the United States is 85.6 centimeters (33.7 inches). As the Triassic period began, the Southwest moved north from the equator. Map by NOAA(public domain) modified for the[emailprotected]project. We are largely unaware of this precipitation because of the Southern California Chamber of Commerce and a lack of rain gauges. Typically, a storm blows itself out once the warm air has moved up and the cool air has moved down. The Drought Monitor is a more recent and more detailed index based on several other indices (including Palmer), along with additional factors such as snow water content, groundwater levels, reservoir storage, pasture/range conditions, and other impacts. The average annual temperature in most of the Southwest is predicted to rise 2.2 to 5.5C (4 to 10F) by 2100. This fire, which started as two separate fires that merged, began in April 2022 and has since burned more than 138,000 hectares (340,000 acres) of land and over 300 homes. Monsoon region averaged over all land gridpoints, 20N37N, 102W115W. In New Mexico, climate is characterized by arid, semiarid, or continental conditions, with light precipitation, low humidity, and abundant sunshine. SW Precipitation Precipitation in the Southwest has two distinct seasons. Although there has been a fair amount of research into the monsoon, there are still far more questions than answers about how it works, and if the seasonal amount of rain, potential start date, or other characteristics can be predicted. In winter, daily temperatures in the southwest are cooler with highs in the 50s and 60s F, and lows in . Hailstones from a storm in Limon, Colorado, 2010. In fact, this monsoon may turn out to be the wettest on record for some places! Photo by James St. John (flickr,Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license, image cropped and resized). Smog (haze caused by air pollution) over Salt Lake City, Utah, 2016. Earth 150 million years ago, near the end of the Jurassic Period. Data source: National Drought Mitigation Center, 20213Web update: April2021. A couple of field campaigns, including the Arizona-based South-West Monsoon Project (SWAMP, 1993) and the international North American Monsoon Experiment (NAME, 2004), provided a lot of observational data and resulted in a better understanding of the mechanics of the monsoon. Climate at a glance. During the Paleocene to Eocene, the Southwests climate was warm and wet, and large mammals roamed the forested landscape. The population of any industrialized and particularly wealthy country produces pollution; the majority of these emissions come from the use of petroleum. The Southwest experiences nearly every variety of extreme weather; heat snaps and cold waves, droughts, floods, blizzards, and even tornados are all considerations for residents of the southwestern states. Sun and storm in Weld County, in the Great Plains region of Colorado, 2015. A blog about monitoring and forecasting El Nio, La Nia, and their impacts. Average annual preciptiation for the southwestern U.S. Fossils of a cycad (Dioonopsis praespinulosa) from the Paleocene Castle Rock Flora, Colorado. What is the climate in the Southwest region in summer? Summer- The summer in the Southwest region is hot and desert-like. Climate changepast, present & future: a very short guide. This planting zone combines saline water and alkaline soil with intense sunlight, high temperatures and varying elevations. NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report covers observed and potential future changes in the North American Monsoon. Fossil mammals adapted to colder temperatures are found in the Pleistocene of Colorado. Cattle ranches throughout the southwestern states rely on rain-fed grazing forage, making them extremely susceptible to climate change and drought. The strengthened Gulf Stream carried more warm, moist air with it into the northern Atlantic, which caused increased snowfall in high latitudes, leading to accelerating cooling. The Southwest is typically dry, hot, and humid. Thus, even a small increase in temperature (which drives evaporation) or a decrease in precipitation in this already arid region can seriously threaten natural systems and society. :https://earthathome.org/de/talk-about-climate/, Digital Encyclopedia of Earth Science: What is climate? While changes in the growing season can have a positive effect on some crops (such as melons and sweet potatoes), altered flowering patterns due to more frost-free days can lead to early bud bursts, damaging perennial crops such as nuts and stone fruits. Precipitation forms. Across New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, summer rains originate from moisture brought into the area from the Gulf of Mexico. The location of the Southwest and the topographical extremes across this area strongly influence its weather. NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). Large glaciers were found at higher elevations, and temperatures were cool. Later in the Jurassic, the climate became more moderate; dune fields were replaced by rivers and floodplains populated by a rich dinosaur fauna (exemplified by the Morrison Formation) and large trees along rivers, streams, and grasslands. Annual Weather SummaryNovember 2022 to October 2023. Average is based on 19792020 using CPC Unified data. Large portions of the Southwest have experienced drought conditions since weekly Drought Monitor records began in 2000. By the start of the Late Cretaceous, this inland sea, called the Western Interior Seaway, divided North America in two; the water was rich with mosasaurs, giant clams, and other marine life. Famous sheriffs like Wyatt Earp and outlaws like Billy the . Volcanic activity was strong. . Percent of total annual precipitation occurring during JulySeptember, based on 19792020 using CPC Unified rain-gauge-based data. Published June 22, 2021 Updated Aug. 23, 2022. The globe about 485 million years ago, near the Cambrian-Ordovician boundary. Cambrian trilobites from the Bright Angel Shale (Tonto Group), Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona. Photo of USNM P 38052 by Frederic Cochard (Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, public domain). Convective mixing stops because the vertical column of air has turned over so that the cool air is at the bottom and the warm air is at the top. Large portions of the Southwest have experienced drought conditions since weekly Drought Monitor records began in 2000. Andrews Glacier in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, at two points in time. The American Southwest, here defined as the area between 95W and 125W and 25N and 40N, 9 covers over four million square kilometers. Thick salt deposits accumulated in the northwestern Four Corners area as the seas evaporated. National Drought Mitigation Center. For many of us, the word monsoon conjures images of heavy rain lasting for months. Kppen climate map of the 48 contiguous states of the continental United States. Some areas were more than 2F warmer than average (see Figure 1). Average temperatures range from about 60 to 80 F in Paris, while in Nice and on the south coast they range from around 80 to 90 F. In recent years, heatwaves in Paris and elsewhere have brought record-breaking temperatures, sometimes exceeding 100 degrees F. Summer storm systems are common. NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin (NASA Earth Observatory,used following NASA's image use policy). The Southwest's overall average high temperature of 19.2C (66.6F) and average low of 2.8C (37.0F) are indicative of a varied climate, one much less uniform than that found in many other parts of the United States. Cumbres in the San Juan Mountains receives nearly 7.6 meters (300 inches) of snowfall annually, while Manassa, less than 50 kilometers (30 miles) away in the San Luis Valley, receives only about 63 centimeters (25 inches) of snow a year. Today, most of the Southwest experiences about 17 fewer freezing days than it did over the last century. As the summer heat builds over North America, a region of high pressure forms over the U.S. Southwest, and the wind becomes more southerly, bringing moisture from the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California. Figure by Ingrid Zabel for PRI's [emailprotected] project (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license). Nighttime winter temperatures in the desert can drop slightly below freezing. These increased temperatures lead to a whole host of other effects, including a decrease in snowpack, declines in river flow, drier soils from more evaporation, and the increased likelihood of drought and fires. Submitted by rebecca.lindsey on Thu, 09/30/2021 - 10:15, Science & information for a climate-smart nation. In the middle Cretaceous, oceans covered most of the Southwest, with the exception of parts of Arizona and New Mexico. Water vapor animation for the afternoon of August 22, 2018 showing the monsoon circulation and thunderstorm formation (dark blue, green, dark red). Zack and Mike mention that last year was an extremely dry monsoon, and this year is extremely wet. What happened that make TS Nora so underwhelming? On the other hand, New Mexico and northern Mexico are near or a bit below average. This page uses Google Analytics. Changes include formatting and revisions to the text and images. Glaciers in the Colorado Rockies are sustained largely by avalanches and wind-blown snow. USA 107(50):2125621262. Water, climate change, and sustainability in the Southwest. 2010. Rainfall, as anyone who has read the ENSO Blog before will know, is an extremely complicated thing to predict! For extended periods from 2002 to 2005 and from 2012 to2020, nearly the entire region was abnormally dry or even drier (see Figure 2). 2021. People in the Southwest are particularly dependent on surface water supplies like Lake Mead, which are vulnerable to evaporation. (2) In fact, comparing 1955, a year with very similar total rainfall in Tucson as this year, to this year shows temperature between July 1 and August 23 were on average more than 2 degrees F warmer. Roadcut exposing lake sediments of the Eocene Green River Formation, Duchesne County, Utah. The Central American Isthmus, which today makes up most of Panama and Costa Rica, rose out of the ocean at approximately this time, formed by undersea volcanoes. Large lakes covered parts of northern Utah and Colorado. A large, low-latitude desert formed along Pangaea's western margin, generating extensive dune deposits. Sand dunes started to become widespread. Because higher temperatures mean greater evaporation and warmer air can hold more water, precipitation will occur in greater amounts at a time, but less frequently. Data from the Northeast Regional Climate Center Applied Climate Information System; 2079-2099 image shows the weighted mean of downscaled CMIP5 models in the LOCA dataset. Summer heat waves will become hotter and longer, while winter cold snaps will occur less often. The cycling layers in thesandstone represent changes in the direction of prevailing winds as large sand dunes migratedacross the desert. This led to global cooling and dropping global sea levels. Every part of the Southwest experienced higher average temperatures between 2000 and 2020 than the long-term average (1895-2020). (41-60 degrees.) Much of the Southwest became an archipelago of warm shallow seaways and uplifted islands, with terrestrial swampy forests and shallow sea floors populated by bivalves, brachiopods, arthropods, corals, and fish. A car with a windshield damaged by hailstones, Limon, Colorado, 2010. Home Regions Southwest Key Points: Right (2):Crown of leaves from a mature plant. But El Nio leads to more tropical storms than average, youre saying, because youre not new here. Alaska weather and daylight varies wildly by region and season, from short-sleeves in summer to down jackets in winter; from 7 rainy days in May in Southcentral to 17 rainy days in the Inside Passage. Water supply is an important issue in the Southwest, and communities will need to adapt to changes in precipitation, snowmelt, and runoff as the climate changes. 2021. Right: As the vertical column of air turns over, with warm air at the top and cool air at the bottom, the storm begins to dissipate. The climate remained warm, despite large southern ice sheets, but it had grown much drier. With the start of the Paleozoic era, climates across the world were warm, and North America was located in the low and warmer latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere. However, the Southwest is located between the mid-latitude and subtropical atmospheric circulation regimes, and this positioning relative to shifts in these . The warmer the air near the surface is relative to the air above it, the more potential energy it has to move up. In general, places in the east and south of the UK tend to be drier, warmer, sunnier and less windy than those further west and north. He pointed out that ENSO does influence Pacific tropical storms, which can supply moisture to the monsoon. The North Rim is 8000 feet (2438meters) to 9000 feet (2743 meters) above sea level. For southern and western Colorado, the intrusions of moist air are most common from mid July into September associated with wind patterns sometimes called the Southwest Monsoon. This figure uses the U.S. Drought Monitor classification system, which is described in the table in the Droughtindicator. North America's position near the equator kept its climate relatively warm. Map of the Gulf of Mexico region before the closure of the Isthmus of Panama. Glaciers covered most of the world's southern landmasses, which were located over the South Pole. Used under a Creative Commons license.