Abstract

Evaluation of historical patterns of climate change and variability throughout the Rocky Mountains can help us understand how these climates may change in the future under altered regional and global forcings.  Analysis of long-term records from 79 climate stations in the Northern, Central, and Southern US Rockies reveals significant 20th century trends in seasonal precipitation, minimum and maximum temperature, and diurnal temperature range (the range has narrowed).  These long-term trends differ by region, season, and elevation.  High elevation trends are either an amplification or diminution of a lowland signal, or fully decoupled. Interannual variability patterns also differ by region, as do teleconnections with global atmospheric circulation patterns reflected by Southern Oscillation and North Pacific indices.  Global and regional climate modeling and land surface process modeling studies indicate that Rocky Mountain climate responses to broad-scale forcing will not be uniform, but rather will depend strongly on elevation and region.  These historical and model-based analyses all suggest that future patterns of climate change in the Rockies will reflect not only extraregional forcing but also substantial reworking by mountain processes.
 

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