Large lakes have a substantial effect on regional and local weather patterns. However, in climate models used to investigate future climate changes, lakes are greatly simplified and sometimes absent due to the inclusion of lakes adding complexity and cost. New research analyzes climate models and discussess the barriers faced in uncovering the treatment of large lakes.

New research could explain recent extreme marine heatwaves, and points to a future with more frequent and extreme heat waves as global temperatures continue to rise.

Results show that incorporating observations improves the simulation of the drought category, detection of drought conditions, and reduces instances of drought false alarms.

The Drought Task Force’s rapid response will help us understand the ongoing drought’s causes, how our science is helping us understand the drought, to what extent climate change is playing a role, and how the event may evolve.

Climate Variability & Predictability (CVP) and Modeling, Analysis, Predictions and Projections (MAPP) funded a recent study which proposes a newly-named global teleconnection linking cooling temperature trends over Eurasia and warming trends in the Arctic to variability in low-frequency tropical sea surface temperatures.