Kelly Gleason takes snow reflectivity measurements in Wyoming in 2019. —Christina Aragon
ASK A SKIER and they’ll tell you the seasons are getting shorter. Ask a hunter and they’ll tell you herds are being driven out by fire. Ask a fisher and they’ll tell you salmon runs are smaller. Climate change is transforming the Pacific Northwest.
“It’s helpful for us to be able to quantify what to expect so we can prepare for it,” says Kelly Gleason, an assistant professor of eco-hydro-climatology at Portland State University. “The future is going to be very different than what we’re used to.”
It’s helpful for us to be able to quantify what to expect so we can prepare for it.
Gleason is one of many Portland State researchers working to understand exactly what’s happening to our climate so scientists can develop effective mitigation strategies.
Her research focuses on the relationship between snowpack and wildfire. So far, the data points to an accelerating cycle in which each change feeds the next. “Snow is melting faster, which lengthens fire season. And forest fires lead to snowpack melting faster,” she says. “It’s a vicious cycle.”
In September 2020, the Archie Creek Fire (seen here) scorched 131,542 acres east of Roseburg. According to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management, the historic 2020 Oregon wildfires destroyed 4,021 homes. Between 2015 and 2019 all of Oregon’s wildfires combined burned 93 homes.—U.S. Forest ServiceANDY MCEVOY, a graduate student in environmental science and management, has been studying forest fires in the Clackamas Basin. In his simulations, wildfires like the ones that burned across more than a million acres of Oregon in a matter of days last summer are likely to become more common. In the Cascade Range of Oregon and Washington, the data points not only to larger average fires, but also to more extreme forest fires.
“No matter which scenario we model, they all projected more days that are conducive to fire spread,” he says. The simulations showed that the fire season increased from as little as eight days to as many as 32. Hotter days with lower relative humidity mean more opportunity for dry wood to ignite and for fire to spread and grow. In the least impacted scenario—with the coolest and wettest weather—the average area burned by wildfires increased by 50%. In the most extreme—the hottest and driest—it increased by 540%. For the Clackamas Basin region, that’s the difference between a burn the size of the John F. Kennedy International Airport and one the size of Manhattan.
“We can’t reverse temperature changes or relative humidity,” McEvoy says, “but there are some creative and effective solutions that would reduce the likelihood of an ignition—from a cigarette butt, campfire, piece of equipment, powerline, whatever it is—that coincides with some of these really severe weather events we’re forecasting in the future.”
McEvoy’s research shows that increased messaging about wildfire danger, coupled with ignition management scenarios like shutting off power lines before a large storm, could reduce human-caused ignitions by approximately 75%.
Professor Emeritus Andrew Fountain has been remapping the glaciers of the western United States. Everywhere he goes, glaciers are disappearing. These photos show Mount Hood’s White River Glacier in 1902 versus 2018.ANDREW FOUNTAIN, professor emeritus of geology and geography, studies another aspect of the changing climate—the effect on glaciers. He is currently working with the U.S. Forest Service to remap all of the glaciers in the western United States. He’ll use that information to get a more accurate picture of not only how glaciers are changing, but also how fast.
One of the biggest issues impacting glaciers is the trend toward more winter rain and less snow.
“That doesn’t nourish the glaciers. And it reduces our winter snowpack,” Fountain says.
Snowpack acts like natural water storage in the Northwest, releasing its supply in the spring and early summer. Reduced snowpack also leads to more glacier melt because glacier ice is exposed to sunlight sooner and begins melting earlier. Fountain’s research shows that the larger glaciers on Mount Hood lost 30-40% of their area between 2000 and 2018. Looking at the Three Sisters, the larger glaciers lost 20-50% of their area.
“Glacier change is very tangible evidence of climate change. You can talk about warm temperatures or more or less precipitation, but that’s qualitative in terms of our experience,” he says. “The glacier used to be here and now it’s over there. That’s tangible for everyone.”
“The glacier used to be here and now it’s over there. That’s tangible for everyone.”
This knowledge is vital because it’s important to understand how much of the Earth’s water is being stored on land. Most glacier ice melt occurs in August and September after the seasonal snow has melted away, maintaining streamflows in the hottest, driest parts of the summer. The agriculture on the north side of Mount Hood is a beneficiary of this process.
“During the Ice Age, a lot of ice was stored in the landscape and the ocean levels were lower. Now we’re melting the ice off the land, putting it in the ocean, and the sea levels are rising,” Fountain says. “This research is part of the global effort to understand how much water is being lost from glaciers and contributing to sea level rise.”
GLEASON, the eco-hydro-climatologist, is studying how to mitigate widespread impacts by using fire to maintain snowpack levels.
“Forests with more open areas tend to accumulate more snow,” she says. That could mean that targeted use of fire, to burn out underbrush and create more open areas, might create conditions that help snow melt less quickly.
Without mitigation, regional impacts will get worse. Some are already being felt, Gleason says. For instance, in recent years, dams along the Clackamas River, like many in the area, must release water just to ensure salmon have enough water for their annual run around Labor Day.
“[Water resource managers] haven’t hit their target water levels for the last decade,” Gleason says. “It’s going to be a lot more common that we have to make value judgments.”
Holding back water for summer demand could lead to flooding as weather phenomena like atmospheric rivers—corridors of concentrated moisture capable of carrying massive amounts of rain—continue to occur.
“Unfortunately, we don’t really have the data to make those decisions,” Gleason says. But, she adds, Oregon is becoming a water-scarce state where shortages—similar to those seen in California—could become the norm.
Understanding how these elements work together is key to not only setting expectations for the future, but working toward solutions. As Gleason says, it’s going to take more than shorter showers to save the planet: “For change to happen it’s going to have to be all of us working together.”