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TWDB Drought Report for the Week of February 3, 2015

i Feb 6th No Comments by

We saw some improvement in drought conditions in the Panhandle, but statewide reservoir storage has remained flat. We are just under one percentage point fuller compared to this time last year, and that was the lowest statewide reservoir storage had been since 1990 for this time of year.

The drought outlook for February shows continued drought with drought conditions developing along the Red River north of the Metroplex.


Some notes from Dr. Wentzel:

  • The most recent drought map released by the U.S. Drought Monitor, for conditions as of Tuesday, February 3rd, shows improvement in parts of the Panhandle. Other areas of the state were unchanged. The area of the state free of drought impacts (Nothing) increased by about 2 percentage points.
  • Exceptional (D4) Drought was down about 0.2 percentage points. The area of Moderate (D1) or worse drought was reduced by about ½ a percentage point to approximately 38½ percent of the state, the best value for this measure since November 2010.
  • Statewide conservation storage was up about 25,000 acre-feet (about 0.1 percentage point) in the past week. Current storage is about ¾ percentage point better than this time last year, but still about 16 percentage points below what is considered normal for this time of year.
  • As of Thursday, February 5th, conservation storage was up in 5, unchanged in 2, and down in 2 of 9 climate regions with reservoirs across the state. The Trans Pecos had the largest gain, up 0.8 percentage points. The Upper Coast had the largest decline, down 0.4 percentage points. All other changes were 0.3 percentage points of less.
  • Conservation storage (as a percentage of capacity) increased in 10 of the 20 municipal reservoir systems that we track across the state, remained unchanged in 7, and decreased in 3. El Paso had the largest gain, up ½ a percentage point. Two other systems (Dallas and Waco) were up 0.4 percentage points each. Nacogdoches had the largest decrease, down 0.6 percentage points.
  • The National Weather Service’s Monthly Drought Outlook for February shows no improvement is expected for drought conditions in Texas during the coming month. A small area along the Red River in North Central Texas is even expected to fall back into drought. This continues a recent trend of pessimistic outlooks for drought recovery in Texas. February is historically a low rainfall month in Texas so, even with the possible development of weak El Niño conditions (50-60% chance), precipitation this month is not expected to be enough to bring about significant improvement.

Download the full Report.

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