ACCAP Climate Webinars promote dialogue and a forum for discussion and information exchange between all stakeholders in Alaska. Accessible statewide, the webinars identify existing information gaps and how best to fill them. Each webinar starts with 20–30 minutes of presentation followed by discussion and questions from participants.
ACCAP has a webinar scheduled for 17 June, 2014 at 10am AKDT time. Stephanie A McAfee of the University of Nevada, Reno is speaking on "Precipitation trends in Alaska: Data limitations and complex controls".
Changes in precipitation are important drivers of many observed hydrological and ecological processes, and precipitation is a key component of many studies. However, existing studies of precipitation trends in Alaska simply did not agree about the magnitude or even direction of trends. We revisited the question, analyzing homogeneity and trends in station data and three commonly used gridded precipitation data sets. We identified numerous inhomogeneities in both the station data and the gridded products and discovered that the three gridded products displayed very dissimilar patterns of trend. Finally, we will present some suggests for moving forward despite the imperfect data.
Study authors: Stephanie McAfee (UN - Reno), Galina Guentchev (NCAR) and Jon K. Eischeid (CIRES)
Pre-registration for webinars is strongly encouraged. The audio portion of the call is through a toll-free phone line and the slide presentation is streamed via computer. For instructions on participating through your home office or at a satellite viewing location with others in your community, please see our webinar information page. General webinar information including podcast subscription information and instructions on how to join a webinar can be found at the link above.