Western Canadians depend on melting snowpack in the Rocky Mountains to provide them with water but that snowpack is rapidly diminishing. Snowpack in the U.S. Rockies has shrunk by about 20 per cent since 1980, largely because of warmer springs, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
“The trends we do see in Canada are consistent with this study and it is disconcerting,” said Shawn Marshall, a climatologist and glaciologist at the University of Calgary in western Canada.
“It’s going to mean a real change in our water supply and our water systems here — things we’re already seeing — but this is just more evidence that this is likely to continue and accelerate going forward.”
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