Study: Blizzards may become less common in Iowa due to climate change - Des Moines Register

Study: Blizzards may become less common in Iowa due to climate change

Are you tired of yearly blizzards? Well, Iowa could see fewer blizzards in the years ahead
Victoria Reyna-Rodriguez

A first-of-its-kind study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln shows that the Midwest may see a decline in blizzard occurrence, suggesting a reduced risk of winter hazards.

How are blizzards identified?

Blizzards are defined by the National Weather Service as a winter storm featuring sustained winds of 35-plus mph, and snow that limits visibility to less than one-quarter of a mile, for at least three consecutive hours.

There is often difficulty of determining visibility, though, and blizzards have proven tricky to capture using climate data alone, according to Nebraska Today. The National Weather Service traditionally relies on eyewitness observations to confirm that a blizzard occurred.

How many blizzards has the Midwest seen in past years?

Of the 12,946 blizzard events documented in the U.S. between 1996 and 2020, blizzard activities are the highest in the Northern Plains and Upper Midwest — accounting for more than 10,000 of those blizzards.

North Dakota was the highest contributor, accounting for 2,187 blizzards. Between 1996 and 2020, Iowa alone saw more than 1,000 blizzards.

Nebraska’s Liang Chen used the same models used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, predicting a decrease in U.S. blizzards through the end of the 21st century. Chen recently presented the findings at the 104th annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society, Nebraska Today reported.

“In terms of planning for climate change, people want to know: In the future, how will these blizzards change because of the warming climate?" Chen said. "But there is no study looking at how they will change in the future, based on climate simulations. The major reason is: It’s hard to quantify.”

How will a warming climate decrease blizzards?

Iowa could eventually see 10 fewer days per year of strong winds, according to the study. Nebraska, the Dakotas, Kansas, Minnesota and other neighboring states are projected to see drops in windy days, as well.

This could be due partly to the fact that the Arctic is warming faster than the tropics, smoothing out the temperature gradient that contributes to wind, Chen said. Global warming could affect some of the daily temperature windows necessary for snow, even though winter precipitation is expected to increase in the northern Plains.

Nebraska Today added that greater greenhouse emissions generally translate to steeper increases in average temperature, and the higher-emission scenario predicts a steeper decline in blizzard frequency from 2060-2099.

“Because of higher temperature, precipitation will fall to the ground as rainfall instead of snow,” Chen said. “So even though you have an overall increase in precipitation, your snowfall will decrease.”

Victoria Reyna-Rodriguez is a general assignment reporter for the Register. Reach her at vreynarodriguez@registermedia.com or follow her on Twitter @VictoriaReynaR.