United States Drought Monitor

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The United States Drought Monitor is a collection of measures that allows experts to assess droughts in the United States. The monitor is not an agency but a partnership between the National Drought Mitigation Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the United States Department of Agriculture, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Different experts provide their best judgment to outline a single map every week that shows droughts throughout the United States. The effort started in 1999 as a federal, state, and academic partnership, growing out of an initiative by the Western Governors Association to provide timely and understandable scientific information on water supply and drought for policymakers.

Droughts in the United States

Drought in the United States is similar to that of other portions of the globe. Below normal precipitation leads to drought, which is caused by an above average persistence of high pressure over the drought area. Changes in the track of extratropical cyclones, which can occur during climate cycles such as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, or ENSO, as well as the North Atlantic Oscillation, Pacific Decadal Oscillation, and Atlantic multidecadal oscillation, modulates which areas would be more prone to drought and when drought develops. Increased drought frequency is expected to be one of the effects of global warming. In dry areas, removing grass cover and going with a more natural vegetation for the area can reduce the impact of drought, since a significant amount of fresh water is used to keep lawns green. Droughts are periodic, alternating with floods over a series of years.

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The monitor is produced by a rotating group of authors and incorporates review from a group of 250 climatologists, extension agents, and others across the nation. Each week the authors revise the previous map based on rainfall, snowfall, and other events, and observers' reports of how drought is affecting crops, wildlife, and other indicators. Authors balance conflicting data and reports to come up with a new map every Wednesday afternoon. The map is then released on the following Thursday morning.

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