Preparing Hydro-Climate Inputs for Climate Change in Water Resource Planning

This module describes the process of selecting the best available climate projection information and using it to develop “climate-adjusted weather” inputs to be used for modeling climate change impacts. These modeled impacts can be used for planning of future water resources. Specific steps of this process include: (1) recognizing the general science and terms associated with Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models (AOGCMs); (2) making AOGCMs more regionally applicable through bias correction and downscaling; (3) determining climate change scenarios based on climate projections and selecting specific projections to inform each scenario; and (4) developing climate-adjusted weather inputs associated with each climate change scenario.