Colorado Climate Center

The Colorado River is perhaps the most critical resource to the southwestern United States, providing water to over 40 million people. In an average year, over half of this water comes from western Colorado, primarily in the form of snowmelt when high-elevation seasonal snowpack dissipates in the spring.The Colorado River has been managed with a large series of reservoirs. Seasonal water supply

Drought is a pretty complicated climate extreme to define. Most commonly, it is defined as a precipitation deficit - much less precipitation falls than what is typically expected for a given time period. But drought can be observed in lots of ways: lack of snowpack, low flows in rivers and streams, dry soils, higher evaporative losses, low lake/reservoir levels, etc. Because the climate varies

Each week, the Colorado Climate Center assembles an assessment of drought-related conditions in the five-state region of Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. Data, maps and summaries consider precipitation, snowpack, streamflow, surface water, evaporative demand, temperature and outlooks for the next week through three months. The Center also offers regular