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Higher temperatures caused by anthropogenic climate change made an ordinary drought into an exceptional drought that parched the American West from 2020-2022, according to a new study by scientists from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS), and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences.  

A new study, published in Nature Communications: Earth and Environment, has found that climate change means it takes about three months longer for California to recover from drought, and probably longer. The study was led by a group of researchers at UC Merced, with funding from NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

Drought intensity is often characterized using meteorological observations, such as precipitation, rather than hydrologic observations, such as reservoir levels and groundwater levels. While precipitation indicates the amount of water entering an area, precipitation models do not determine the amount of water retained in a watershed or the amount lost due to runoff and evapotranspiration, which are important factors for drought management. Researchers from the University of Montana addressed this need by producing a drought index that captures changes in both surface and subsurface hydrologic reservoirs/pools using a rapidly growing interdisciplinary field called hydrogeodesy.

NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) has announced up to $4 million in funding for 8 two-year projects as part of the Fiscal Year 2025 NIDIS Coping with Drought: Understanding and Assessing Drought in a Changing Climate competition. This competition seeks projects focused on improving drought indicator performance to account for non-stationarity with the goal of more accurate drought assessments that support communities in preparing for, mitigating, and responding to drought. 

New interactive maps on drought.gov can help users better prepare for heat and drought in their community, with data from NOAA’s National Weather Service. Drought.gov now displays customizable maps showing National Weather Service heat advisories, warnings, and watches, as well as 3–7 and 8–14 day heat hazard outlooks. These maps can be overlaid with the U.S. Drought Monitor to monitor areas where extreme heat may worsen existing drought conditions. 

Research on ecological drought demonstrates that while many species are tolerant of water shortages, others may experience declines, with recovery taking years or even decades after drought ends. The new study, funded by the USGS National Climate Adaptation Science Center, discussed an even more extreme possibility—that some ecosystems will never recover from drought. 

The National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) is excited to co-organize two sessions as part of the American Meteorological Society's 105th annual meeting.

Before summer took hold, Washington issued a nearly-statewide drought declaration, allowing funding to become available for drought relief.

A Lousiana State University-led paper, with funding from NOAA's National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS), the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Geological Survey, used a metric known as the Evaporative Demand Drought Index, or EDDI, to quantify drought conditions and examine their relationship to Mississippi River flow. Using evaporative demand as a lens to view conditions in Louisiana and through the upper Mississippi River basin brought a surprising finding into focus—that low water levels in the Mississippi correlated more closely to EDDI than to precipitation.

On June 24, NOAA Climate Program Office’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) and Modeling, Analysis, Predictions and Projections (MAPP) program jointly announced $4.9 million in funding for NOAA labs and research partners to improve drought monitoring and prediction in the American West.