With the release of the National Climate Assessment (NCA5) this week, the IEM daily feature has been looking at some of the trends denoted in the report. Today's feature highlights Figure 2-4, which presents a map of annual, winter, and summer season change in total precipitation. The featured chart presents the unofficial IEM spatially averaged precipitation annual total value for Iowa. A simple long term mean is plotted, along with a 30 year trailing average and a recent 30 year average. A number of very wet years over the past two decades has helped to push the trend upward for Iowa, but this year will very likely come in well below average. Climate change is not a simple, linear, and constant change in some climate variable each year, but is a nuanced and complicated interplay between many factors that yields some bulk change over time.

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Tags:   nca5