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Analysis of historical drought conditions based on SPI and SPEI at various timescales in the South Saskatchewan River Watershed, Alberta, Canada

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Abstract

Drought is one of the most challenging extreme weather events which can cause catastrophic and long-lasting impacts on water availability, environment, agriculture, economies, and societies. This study investigates the historical changes of drought conditions in Southern Alberta, Canada (and the South Saskatchewan River Watershed (SSRW) specifically), which is dominated by agricultural activity, or otherwise related to environmental variables, and has experienced severe droughts in the past. We studied interdecadal drought variation at different severity levels as well as long-term monotonic trends and occurrence rates at a high resolution in the SSRW in the past four decades. We employed SPI (standardized precipitation index) and SPEI (standardized precipitation-evapotranspiration index) as drought indicators at 1-, 3-, 6-, 9-, and 12-month timescales, to explore significant changes during 1980–2018. The indices were computed using a high-resolution Daymet-gridded dataset for the SSRW. Constructed drought occurrence maps revealed that, on average, this region experienced drought in nearly half of the analysis period. Comparing the past four decades revealed that the drought-affected area increased during 2001–2010 and that the areas with severe or extreme droughts increased significantly over the last two decades (compared to 1980–2000). The results show decreasing trends of drought in some areas, mainly in the headwaters of the Bow River in the Rocky Mountains, and increasing trends in larger areas, mostly downstream. The area with a significant trend (increasing or decreasing) was greater with longer timescales of drought indices. This indicates the areas in the vicinity where meteorological drought was increasing (decreasing), showing the same pattern of change at higher timescales, implying increased (decreased) moisture availability that can imply hydrological drought. Comparing the two drought indices suggests significant differences in some geographical areas and generally better performance of SPEI in detecting dry conditions.

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Data availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available because they belong to the University of Lethbridge and partnering agencies but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express their sincere thanks to the editor of the journal and two anonymous reviewers whose comments helped improving this manuscript substantially.

Funding

This research received much appreciated financial support through funds from the University of Lethbridge, Siksika SRDL Business Group, Old Sun Community College, the Alberta Real Estate Foundation, the Government of Canada and the Government of Alberta through the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, and the MITACS National R&D Consortium (Funding Ref. No. IT28955).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geography and Environment, University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, AB, Canada

    Roya Mousavi, Dan Johnson & James Byrne

  2. Lethbridge Research and Development Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Lethbridge, AB, Canada

    Roland Kroebel

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  1. Roya Mousavi
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Roya Mousavi wrote the draft of the manuscript and prepared all the tables and figures. All the authors were involved in the design of the methods and reviewed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to James Byrne.

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Mousavi, R., Johnson, D., Kroebel, R. et al. Analysis of historical drought conditions based on SPI and SPEI at various timescales in the South Saskatchewan River Watershed, Alberta, Canada. Theor Appl Climatol 153, 873–887 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-023-04495-0

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