|
Abstract:
|
Where CA receives water versus where it needs water is the fundamental problem facing California's socioeconomic future. A key component to this problem is the far western US precipitation dipole. This dipole is the predominant hydroclimatic feature of the far western United States, characterized by a N-S anti phased precipitation regime centered on ~40 N latitude (Cayan et al. 1998; Dettinger et al., 1998, Wise 2010). The position of the dipole dictates where CA receives its winter precipitation; thus, it is critical to understand the dipole from a paleoperspective, which at the present is unknown. Recently, efforts to characterize paleoclimatic features at lakes south of the dipole through well-dated lacustrine cores have been undertaken (Kirby 2014, Kirby et al. 2010, 2013). While analyzing these features is vital towards characterizing the dipole, statistical methods for assessing the temporal coordinates associated with dipole variability are far too granular. In this paper the authors propose modern statistical methodologies for characterizing the uncertainty in historic dipole variability using core samples from Zaca and Abbott lakes.
|
