Presenter: Rick Lader, Postdoctoral Fellow, Alaska Climate Adaptation Science Center

Southeast Alaska has been under drought conditions for the past two years, with precipitation deficits of greater than 100 cm in some locations. These conditions have impacted hydropower electricity generation, fish habitat and forest health. Given the region’s extreme topographical gradients, newly produced dynamically downscaled datasets are used to help resolve and study changes on this landscape.

This seminar looks at historical precipitation trends, rain/snow partitioning and precipitation intensities from the downscaled Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR). These data are at 4-km spatial resolution across Southeast Alaska from 1981-2018. Future projections (2031-2060) of these indices are also investigated using downscaled simulations from the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Climate Model version 3 (GFDL-CM3). Bias correction methods for the climate model simulations are also considered.