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Updated: Dec 3, 2025

In Situ Soil Moisture Sensors in Undisturbed Soils
Published on: November 18, 2022
Snow water scarcity induced by record-breaking warm winter in 2020 in Japan
Satoshi Watanabe1, Shunji Kotsuki2,3,4, Shinjiro Kanae5
1School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, 113-8656, Japan. stswata@hydra.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp.
Abstract:
This study highlights the severity of the low snow water equivalent (SWE) and remarkably high temperatures in 2020 in Japan, where reductions in SWE have significant impacts on society due to its importance for water resources. A continuous 60-year land surface simulation forced by reanalysis data revealed that the low SWE in many river basins in the southern snowy region of mainland Japan are the most severe on record. The impact of the remarkably high temperatures in 2020 on the low SWE was investigated by considering the relationships among SWE, temperature, and precipitation. The main difference between the 2020 case and prior periods of low SWE is the record-breaking high temperatures. Despite the fact that SWE was the lowest in 2020, precipitation was much higher than that in 2019, which was one of the lowest SWE on record pre-2020. The results indicate the possibility that even more serious low-SWE periods will be caused if lower precipitation and higher temperatures occur simultaneously.
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