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Model projections of an imminent transition to a more arid climate in southwestern North America.

Seager R, Ting M, Held I, Kushnir Y, Lu J, Vecchi G, Huang HP, Harnik N, Leetmaa A, Lau NC, Li C, Velez J, Naik N

Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO), Columbia University, Palisades, NY 10964, USA. seager@ldeo.columbia.edu

How anthropogenic climate change will affect hydroclimate in the arid regions of southwestern North America has implications for the allocation of water resources and the course of regional development. Here we show that there is a broad consensus among climate models that this region will dry in the 21st century and that the transition to a more arid climate should already be under way. If these models are correct, the levels of aridity of the recent multiyear drought or the Dust Bowl and the 1950s droughts will become the new climatology of the American Southwest within a time frame of years to decades.

Published 25 May 2007 in Science, 316(5828): 1181-4.
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