Global to Regional: Origins of Water Stress (GROWS)

The Global to Regional: Origins of Water Stress (GROWS) project aims to bring the global origin of water to regional relevance in the western US. Water availability and stress can have profound regional consequences to the state outlook for agriculture, tourism, and quality of life. However, the role of the atmosphere in distributing water encompasses the globe and requires a wholistic approach to understand and constrain how water moves and how error propagates in our understanding of these processes. Linking the origins of regional water stress to global precursors offers a unique avenue for research infrastructure development that will serve to grow Wyoming’s prominence globally. This will create new research connections and provide a framework that can be used to demonstrate to students and stakeholders alike, how global changes impact their own backyard. Water availability is critical to the future of the western US. The global atmospheric circulation carries moisture from warm, tropical regions and deposits it as precipitation far from its source. Changes in evaporative fluxes and atmospheric circulation can either bring deluges or drought. We must rely on Global Climate Models (GCMs) to predict how these moisture fluxes will change on the scale of decades to centuries. Here, we propose to utilize the E3 GCM, being developed by NASA-GISS, to provide robust ensemble forecasts of moisture convergence in the US West on decadal time scales. GISS-E3 is unique because it has structured its development around a perturbed physics ensemble (PPE) where model uncertainty is systematically explored by randomly varying model parameters within their probable range. The GISS-E3 PPE can be confronted with observations of the current atmosphere to objectively select the model configuration that is most consistent with the real world. Here, we will develop a suite of observational metrics that act to constrain moisture convergence (and ultimately precipitation) into the US West. This work will enable us to identify global origins of seasonal moisture trends and provide future predictions. We will do this utilizing back trajectory modelling to link source regions of enhanced moisture in future scenarios. This will yield physical understanding of linkages between global circulation and US West precipitation. This work will create a framework for NASA and the University of Wyoming (UWyo) to offer predictions of future moisture convergence for the western US. The framework will be designed in a flexible way so that it can be applied to other regions around the globe. This will place UWyo in collaboration with NASA as a center of hydroclimate modelling with global impact. One direct impact on UWyo will be to provide an ensemble of future forecasts of moisture flux for downscaling in synergy with the Wyoming Anticipating Climate Transitions (WYACT) initiative at the UWyo. This proposal supports two Assistant Professor-level faculty, the development of their respective research groups, and leverages their expertise in global modeling, remote sensing, and observational data. Funding from this grant will support a student and a postdoctoral scholar, who will, with their faculty advisors, develop this framework. Specific collaboration-building activities are planned.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

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