Clayton and other water officials have estimated it would take years of work to recover. The snowpack has helped raise the Great Salt Lake by a foot after it reached a historic low in November, but it’s unlikely to do much more to replenish water levels there or at Lake Powell. This is going to do a lot to help the systems.” There are some that are so depleted they won’t fill up … but this is going to be great for our reservoirs. We’ll have more information later in the spring, but we expect quite a lot of our reservoirs to be replenished within the state of Utah. He continued, “From that perspective, it’s really a mixed story. “We, particularly in the west, are heavily impacted by what we would call hydrological drought, which has much more to do with how much we’re storing and how much our reserves have been depleted.” We tend to think of drought as how long it has been since it’s rained or snowed. “When we consider drought, we have to consider the different categories. Clayton said an excellent snowpack will lead to overall drought reduction.

Light snow was expected throughout the Wasatch Mountains.Īdditional storms are needed to help build the snowpack and ensure the state’s reservoirs are replenished when the seasons change. The National Weather Service issued several winter storm warnings for Southern Utah ahead of the weekend. Clayton noted another Summit County water source, the Weber River Basin, is doing great.įorecasts indicate that snow is likely to continue through the beginning of February, though the rest of the season is unknown. The Provo-Utah Lake-Jordan watershed also reported record-high snow water equivalent as of Wednesday. Nine basins, including the one that contains the Provo River, are greater than 200%. The report states that every major basin in the state is greater than 160% of normal snow water equivalent, except for the Raft watershed in northwest Utah. The Utah Snow Survey, using data from previous years, predicted the maximum snow water equivalent will reach roughly 22 inches – which is around 155% of normal – by early April. “We’re roughly 80 days ahead of schedule,” he said.

And it’s still possible that our peak snowpack won’t be as high, but as of today, we are beating 2011,” Clayton said. This is notable because 2011 was an outstanding winter. “We’re nowhere near the end of winter, but for this particular date, we haven’t seen snow water equivalent totals this high, from a statewide perspective, since 2005. The snowfall has aided in Utah’s recovery from the drought, helping to eliminate exceptional drought conditions throughout the state, and is expected to provide much-needed relief to reservoirs this spring. There are historic and record-breaking snowpack conditions across the state, which have contributed to making this season one of the best winters in nearly 20 years, according to Jordan Clayton, a supervisor with the Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Utah Snow Survey. UTAH - Commuters traveling through Parleys Canyons, skiers taking advantage of fresh powder at area resorts and officials working at the state level are all in agreement: Utah is having an exceptional winter. The Provo-Utah Lake-Jordan basin reported record-high snow water equivalent conditions on Wednesday. Snowmobiles travel near the Provo River, along Mirror Lake Highway east of Samak.

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