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Climate Services for Coping with Climate Change, Drought, and
Extreme Heat in the México-U.S. Border Region
and depiction of rapidly developing drought conditions,
sometimes referred to as “flash drought,” partners are working
on evaluating remotely-sensed drought indices (e.g., Vegetation
Drought Response Index (VegDRI), Evaporative Stress Index (ESI),
Evaporative Demand Drought Index (EDDI)), to fill in drought
status in data sparse regions of the border region (Muth
et al.,
,
2017). While development of RGB-specific drought monitoring
products would contribute to increased preparedness for drought,
entities within the region still lack the capacity to systematically
garner regional impact reports and deploy new weather stations,
due to staffing constraints.
Climate forecasts and outlooks
. Forecasts and outlooks, on
time scales ranging from months to decades, are essential for
anticipating climate-related risks and planning for strategic
long-lived infrastructure investments for transportation, urban
development, and water resources (such as dams, culverts, and
buildings). Thus, the strategic goal of the RGB Pilot forecasts
and outlooks initiative is to enhance collaboration on existing
and new operational climate outlook and prediction products at
regional scales. The initiative is multi-faceted, aiming to maximize
the use of existing science and information by decision-makers,
identify service gaps through evaluation and address prediction
and predictability gaps through research collaboration. The RGB
Pilot forecast activities have succeeded in convening meetings of
forecasters, conducting site visits and trainings, improving ongoing
trilateral predictions—such as the North American Ensemble
Forecast System (NAEFS) and the North American Seasonal Forecast
System (NASFS)—and working with seasonal fire forecasters to
improve North American Seasonal Fire Outlooks. The partners
are also working toward development of an objective drought
forecast for North America, which will involve comparison and
assessment of existing objective and consensus forecast methods
used in each country.
