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Abstract. We present a simple method that allows snow depth measurements tobe converted to snow water equivalent (SWE) estimates. These estimates areuseful to individuals interested in water resources, ecological function,and avalanche forecasting. They can also be assimilated into models to helpimprove predictions of total water volumes over large regions. Theconversion of depth to SWE is particularly valuable since snow depthmeasurements are far more numerous than costlier and more complex SWEmeasurements. Our model regresses SWE against snow depth (h), day of wateryear (DOY) and climatological (30-year normal) values for winter (December,January, February) precipitation (PPTWT), and the difference (TD) between meantemperature of the warmest month and mean temperature of the coldest month,producing a power-law relationship. Relying on climatological normals ratherthan weather data for a given year allows our model to be applied atmeasurement sites lacking a weather station. Separate equations are obtainedfor the accumulation and the ablation phases of the snowpack. The model isvalidated against a large database of snow pillow measurements and yields abias in SWE of less than 2 mm and a root-mean-squared error (RMSE) in SWE ofless than 60 mm. The model is additionally validated against two completelyindependent sets of data: one from western North America and one from thenortheastern United States. Finally, the results are compared with three othermodels for bulk density that have varying degrees of complexity and thatwere built in multiple geographic regions. The results show that the modeldescribed in this paper has the best performance for the validation datasets.
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Impact of Snow Grain Shape and Black Carbon–Snow Internal Mixing on Snow Optical Properties: Parameterizations for Climate Models
- Award ID(s):
- 1660587
- PAR ID:
- 10068034
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Climate
- Volume:
- 30
- Issue:
- 24
- ISSN:
- 0894-8755
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 10019 to 10036
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0300.1
