TY - JOUR
T1 - Spatial and temporal variability in seasonal snow density
AU - Bormann, Kathryn J.
AU - Westra, Seth
AU - Evans, Jason P.
AU - McCabe, Matthew
N1 - KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01
Acknowledgements: We thank Andrew Nolan and Jason Venables at Snowy Hydro Limited for their cooperation in providing snow, precipitation and temperature observations; Robert Cabion from AGL Pty Ltd. for additional snow observations; and Barbara Brougham from the School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering at Adelaide University and Rachel V. Blakey for additional editing and comments on the manuscript. Funding to support this research was received from the Australian Research Council as part of the Discovery Project DP0772665.
PY - 2013/3
Y1 - 2013/3
N2 - Snow density is a fundamental physical property of snowpacks used in many aspects of snow research. As an integral component in the remote sensing of snow water equivalent and parameterisation of snow models, snow density may be used to describe many important features of snowpack behaviour. The present study draws on a significant dataset of snow density and climate observations from the United States, Australia and the former Soviet Union and uses regression-based techniques to identify the dominant climatological drivers for snow densification rates, characterise densification rate variability and estimate spring snow densities from more readily available climate data. Total winter precipitation was shown to be the most prominent driver of snow densification rates, with mean air temperature and melt-refreeze events also found to be locally significant. Densification rate variance is very high at Australian sites, very low throughout the former Soviet Union and between these extremes throughout much of the US. Spring snow densities were estimated using a statistical model with climate variable inputs and best results were achieved when snow types were treated differently. Given the importance of snow density information in many snow-related research disciplines, this work has implications for current methods of converting snow depths to snow water equivalent, the representation of snow dynamics in snow models and remote sensing applications globally. © 2013 Elsevier B.V.
AB - Snow density is a fundamental physical property of snowpacks used in many aspects of snow research. As an integral component in the remote sensing of snow water equivalent and parameterisation of snow models, snow density may be used to describe many important features of snowpack behaviour. The present study draws on a significant dataset of snow density and climate observations from the United States, Australia and the former Soviet Union and uses regression-based techniques to identify the dominant climatological drivers for snow densification rates, characterise densification rate variability and estimate spring snow densities from more readily available climate data. Total winter precipitation was shown to be the most prominent driver of snow densification rates, with mean air temperature and melt-refreeze events also found to be locally significant. Densification rate variance is very high at Australian sites, very low throughout the former Soviet Union and between these extremes throughout much of the US. Spring snow densities were estimated using a statistical model with climate variable inputs and best results were achieved when snow types were treated differently. Given the importance of snow density information in many snow-related research disciplines, this work has implications for current methods of converting snow depths to snow water equivalent, the representation of snow dynamics in snow models and remote sensing applications globally. © 2013 Elsevier B.V.
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/10754/562678
UR - https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0022169413000784
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84875407068&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2013.01.032
DO - 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2013.01.032
M3 - Article
SN - 0022-1694
VL - 484
SP - 63
EP - 73
JO - Journal of Hydrology
JF - Journal of Hydrology
ER -