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October 12, 2012--Climate change likely to heat up Western Colorado (Grand Junction Free Press)

Western Colorado could get 6 degrees warmer by 2080, which would make Grand Junction feel like somewhere in Arizona — although probably not as far south as Phoenix. The higher temperatures would also increase the severity of droughts. That was part of the message given by Dr. Jeff Lukas of the Western Water Assessment team at the University of Colorado in the lecture he gave for Colorado Mesa University's Natural Resources of the West Seminar Series on Monday evening titled, “Drought and Climate Change in Colorado: What Can We Expect?” While Lukas said precipitation is much more difficult to predict than temperature, he noted that warmer temperatures will certainly intensify the drought conditions brought on by any dry years. That's because warmer temperatures increase evaporation rates. It doesn't help that in general, dry years tend to be hotter than wet years. The average results of climate modeling for precipitation indicate that conditions are likely to get wetter to the north and drier to the south, with Colorado right on the dividing line between the two.

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