What will this week’s snows mean for Utah’s snowpack?
SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — The massive storms in California are heading for Utah, and parts of the state have received avalanche warnings and winter weather advisories.
ABC4 spoke with Jim Nelson — a professor in Brigham Young University’s civil and construction engineering program who specializes in hydrology and hydro-informatics — about the coming weather and what it could mean for the state. He said rain in the valley typically means snow in the mountains, which is ideal for the snowpack.
“I kind of feel like it’s the best of all scenarios, because it means we have relatively mild weather, no inversion, but we’re still getting the snowpack that we need for the snowmelt runoff later in the spring,” Nelon said. “As long as it stays in moderation.”
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Nelson told ABC4 that this year’s winter weather is still trending slightly above normal, even if the weather is milder than 2023’s record-breaking totals.
“We’re, so far, in a pretty good situation,” Nelson said. “We need a few more storms, though, so I view the upcoming rain and snow in the mountains as a positive thing and not being too much.”
Because 2023’s extreme winter was coming on the heels of several years of drought, Nelson said there was plenty of available storage in reservoirs. For 2024, Nelson said the closer-to-normal conditions are a good sign, and the reservoirs should stay closer to full.
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Nelson said reservoirs may be releasing more than normal for this time of year, if expecting a relatively high runoff, in order to ensure enough capacity for when the snow starts melting in April or May.
“If they have low snowpack, or they’re anticipating not very much, they don’t want to release that water so they can hang onto it and have it available in the summer when they need it,” Nelson said.
But what happens when rain meets snow? The rain melts the snow and causes even more runoff.
“All of the water is going to melt and come down at some point,” Nelson said. “Obviously, some of the worst floods in our areas can happen when we have a lot of snow; it’s ripe and ready to melt, and then we get rain. I don’t think we’re in that situation, currently.”
Nelson said effective water management and conservation practices will help the state get through extremes on either end of the spectrum.
“We live in a water-scarce state, generally, so we need to think about better ways to manage the water,” Nelson said. “I think that it’s important that, while things are relatively good, that we continue to think about good management practices and good water conservation and the way that we use it.”
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