My hand-drawing annual average snowfall map of central to eastern (greater) China

[cocoland]

You won't find it elsewhere! China Meteorology Agency does not give official snowfall statistics.

The contours are in centimeters,  so 1 is 0.4 inches, 2.5 is 1 inch, 5 is 2 inches, 10 is 4 inches, 15 is 6 inches, 20 is 8 inches, 30 is 12 inches, 50 is 20 inches, 70 is 28 inches, and 100 is 40 inches.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Urumqi 40''

Changchun 20''

Harbin 18''

Shenyang 16''

Luoyang 8''

Dalian 6''

Nanjing 5''

Beijing 5''

Jinan 5''

Hangzhou 4.5''

Xi'an 4''

Wuhan 4''

Tianjin 4''

Changsha 4''

Lhasa 2.5''

Qingdao 2.5''

Suzhou 1.5''

Kunming 1''

Shanghai 0.8''

Guilin 0.4''

Chengdu 0.1''

Chongqing 0.1''

[cocoland]

I guess it's nice to be compared with the US version

 

[Roger Smith]

Thanks, I wonder why the Chinese state meteorological agency doesn't post maps of that sort? 

Hardly seems like a national secret. Except for Manchuria and higher parts of the western mountains, most of China seems to see very little snow most years. 

[Ace]

On 12/11/2020 at 3:10 PM, cocoland said:

You won't find it elsewhere! China Meteorology Agency does not give official snowfall statistics.

The contours are in centimeters,  so 1 is 0.4 inches, 2.5 is 1 inch, 5 is 2 inches, 10 is 4 inches, 15 is 6 inches, 20 is 8 inches, 30 is 12 inches, 50 is 20 inches, 70 is 28 inches, and 100 is 40 inches.

Great job!

[cocoland]

On 12/15/2020 at 6:58 PM, Roger Smith said:

Thanks, I wonder why the Chinese state meteorological agency doesn't post maps of that sort? 

Hardly seems like a national secret. Except for Manchuria and higher parts of the western mountains, most of China seems to see very little snow most years. 

 

Thank you! I am a weather enthusiast from Beijing and now studying meteorology in Raleigh, North Carolina.

It is because they don't measure snowfall as an accmulation of new snow - the concept of snowfall does not exist in our meteorology, instead we only count snowy days, precipitation, maximum snow depth and snow-covered days for climatology. (I didn't see that kind of map of Europe either - I did see the USA, Russia, and Japan version) 

 

Northern China see much lesser snow compared with the same latitude in US, because the Mongolia high surpresses extratropical storm activity and the Tibetan Plateau locks the phase of westerlies. However, southern China - 33N or less are snowier than the same latitude in US - the persistent heavy snow (and ice) happened in January 2008 almost shut down half of the southern China for nearly one month.

 

The western parts of China might be a little bit different - Altay Prefecture of Xinjiang is the most snowy region in China, of which annual snowfall range from 50 to more than 150 inches (the Kanas Lake) as I estimate.

[cocoland]

What is typical in January...

[MegaMike]

If you couldn't get observations, how did you create your map? I'm assuming you approximated values based on your own judgment.?.

Also, why China (out of curiosity)? 

[cocoland]

42 minutes ago, MegaMike said:

If you couldn't get observations, how did you create your map? I'm assuming you approximated values based on your own judgment.?.

Also, why China (out of curiosity)? 

I am from China, and I think eastern America and eastern China are (most) comparable in climate, both have continental humid and subtropical humid climate (the difference is monsoon).

We observe snow depth once a day at 00UTC (sometimes more than once though)  , but do not have statistics. I don't have data from all stations but some of them.

[MegaMike]

3 minutes ago, cocoland said:

I am from China.

We observe snow depth once a day at 00UTC (sometimes more than once though)  , but do not have statistics. I don't have data from all stations but some of them.

Ah! I didn't see your second comment in this thread. That's what I figured though.

Getting quality controlled snowfall data is extremely difficult even in the U.S. For my snowfall evaluations, I use the GHCND archive to retrieve historical snowfall observations. You can get snowfall, snow depth, liquid water equivalent, etc... from the ftp/https server for all available stations which may include China. I'd try giving it a shot if you haven't already done so. It might help you add more data points onto your map.

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/land-based-station-data/land-based-datasets/global-historical-climatology-network-ghcn

[etudiant]

Hi cocoland,

Your map shows the heaviest snows in the north of China, past around Harbin. The Harbin ice festival is famous, so it is obviously cold, but where does the moisture come from?

The prevailing winds seem to be coming from the Gobi in Mongolia, a pretty dry area afaik. What am I missing?

 

[cocoland]

3 hours ago, etudiant said:

Hi cocoland,

Your map shows the heaviest snows in the north of China, past around Harbin. The Harbin ice festival is famous, so it is obviously cold, but where does the moisture come from?

The prevailing winds seem to be coming from the Gobi in Mongolia, a pretty dry area afaik. What am I missing?

 

Hi etudiant,

Harbin only receives around 4.5mm(0.18 inches) of precipitation / 2 inches of snow in January, which is not high, but this city have nearly six months for snow, and the moisture condition would be much better in Nov and Mar. After all, Harbin locates farther east than 120E and therefore sometimes ahead the trough and have more chance to experience extratropical cyclone(especially in Nov, Dec, and Mar, when the westerlies are more active (in wavy activity)), which bring the moisture from the Sea of Japan, Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea.  Harbin just received 10 inches in one snow storm last month.

[cocoland]

I just drew sketch maps of snowfall in Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb, and Mar, not as high-quality as the annual map though.

 

 

 

 

[cocoland]

6 hours ago, MegaMike said:

Ah! I didn't see your second comment in this thread. That's what I figured though.

Getting quality controlled snowfall data is extremely difficult even in the U.S. For my snowfall evaluations, I use the GHCND archive to retrieve historical snowfall observations. You can get snowfall, snow depth, liquid water equivalent, etc... from the ftp/https server for all available stations which may include China. I'd try giving it a shot if you haven't already done so. It might help you add more data points onto your map.

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-access/land-based-station-data/land-based-datasets/global-historical-climatology-network-ghcn

Thank you for sharing this! One problem is, before 2010, stations in China that of very high latitude and have stable snow cover season only measure snow depth after new snow drops, but we wouldn't know the depth value before that and hence cannot calculate the snowfall. I try to obtain the 2010-present value and then to get liquid-to-snow ratio and published climatology (precipitation, temperature, snowy days, etc) to convert it to an estimated 20-30 year mean value.  

[etudiant]

15 hours ago, cocoland said:

I just drew sketch maps of snowfall in Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb, and Mar, not as high-quality as the annual map though.

Thank you very much for these excellent supplemental maps.

They make it clear that water is crucial in northern China.

With Beijing located in a semi desert region, I can see the logic behind some of China's massive diversion projects  The often unexpected consequences are no surprise to American readers of Mark Reisner's 'Cadillac Desert', which looks at the political and economic drivers and consequences of the comparably massive projects in the western US.

[cocoland]

3 hours ago, etudiant said:

Thank you very much for these excellent supplemental maps.

They make it clear that water is crucial in northern China.

With Beijing located in a semi desert region, I can see the logic behind some of China's massive diversion projects  The often unexpected consequences are no surprise to American readers of Mark Reisner's 'Cadillac Desert', which looks at the political and economic drivers and consequences of the comparably massive projects in the western US.

Well, the vegetation in Beijing is temperate deciduous forest (and for the entire North China Plain), with 580mm (23 inches) rainfall annually mostly in summer, enough for trees but far from enough for people with its huge population .

[cocoland]

Here is another map of "annual average maximum snow depth"(not snowfall) based on all stations made by us. The snowfall of the western parts of China is too difficult to estimate so we haven't done it yet.

* in centimeters

** shown all claimed territory.

Some famous snowy attractions and towns in China (honestly not comparable with Japan, Russia, Northern Europe, Canada, and USA) :

Kanas Lake, Altay Prefecture, Xinjiang - estimated 150 inches (4 meters) of annual snowfall

Altay City, Xinjiang - estimated 70 inches (1.8 meters) of snowfall

Nyalam County, Xigaze, Tibet - estimated 70 inches (1.8 meters) of annual snowfall, with record maximum snow depth of 2.30 meters which made of two snow events. - snowiest national observation station (WMO ID: 55655).

Xuexiang ("snow town") National Forest Park, Changting township, Heilongjiang - estimated 80 inches (2 meters) of snowfall

Heaven Lake of Changbai/Paektu Mountain, Jilin - estimated 100 inches (2.5 meters) of snowfall 

Wendeng District of Weihai City, Shandong - estimated 20 inches (0.5 meters) of snowfall, the snowiest town south of the Great Wall in eastern China.

 

 

[etudiant]

2 hours ago, cocoland said:

Here is another sketch map of "annual average maximum snow depth"(not snowfall) made by us. The snowfall of the western parts of China is too difficult to estimate so we haven't done it yet.

* the contour was mistakenly drawn around Hulun Buir (overestimated).

** in centimeters

*** shown all claimed territory.

Some famous snowy attractions and towns in China (honestly not comparable with Japan, Russia, Northern Europe, Canada, and USA) :

Kanas Lake, Altay Prefecture, Xinjiang - estimated 150 inches (4 meters) of snowfall annually

Altay City, Xinjiang - estimated 70 inches (1.8 meters) of snowfall

Nyalam County, Xigaze, Tibet - estimated 70 inches (1.8 meters) of snowfall annually, with record maximum snow depth of 2.30 meters which made of two snow events. - snowiest national observation station (WMO ID: 55655).

Xuexiang("snow town") National Forest Park, Changting township, Heilongjiang - estimated 80 inches (2 meters) of snowfall

Heaven Lake of Changbai Mountain, Jilin - estimated 100 inches (2.5 meters) of snowfall 

 

This map is just super to illustrate the China water problem, an arid cold season and an irregularly wet warm season.

No one cares about the peripheral regions, the key is redistributing the  surplus during the rainy season in the south.

We now know that the Three Gorges dam was too small, but the local geography was a constraint. Does anyone have better suggestions?

 

[cocoland]

25 minutes ago, etudiant said:

This map is just super to illustrate the China water problem, an arid cold season and an irregularly wet warm season.

No one cares about the peripheral regions, the key is redistributing the  surplus during the rainy season in the south.

We now know that the Three Gorges dam was too small, but the local geography was a constraint. Does anyone have better suggestions?

 

The Three Gorges dam is mainly built for power and control the flood threat in summer. The starting point of the South-North water transfer project is Danjiangkou reservoir located at northwest Hubei. Southern China have rather enough rainfall in winter and the early spring rain season start at March. (attached: January and July mean precipitation in mm)

[etudiant]

Very interesting comment about the Three Gorges, it is at such an important locus of Chinese history that I had thought of it as a more social rather than economic project.

What I don't know is the consideration of the downstream effects of the various water storage/diversion projects.

In the US, the Columbia river dams destroyed  a salmon fishery that was more valuable than the irrigated land produced. I've no idea whether the Chinese dam and diversion projects factor in the impacts on the outflow areas or their fisheries.

[cocoland]

1 minute ago, etudiant said:

Very interesting comment about the Three Gorges, it is at such an important locus of Chinese history that I had thought of it as a more social rather than economic project.

What I don't know is the consideration of the downstream effects of the various water storage/diversion projects.

In the US, the Columbia river dams destroyed  a salmon fishery that was more valuable than the irrigated land produced. I've no idea whether the Chinese dam and diversion projects factor in the impacts on the outflow areas or their fisheries.

The Chinese paddlefish (psephurus gladius) in Yangtze river extinct... https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2020/01/chinese-paddlefish-one-of-largest-fish-extinct/

I can't tell the impact on fishery in terms of economics... I think there have been researches but I didn't focus on it.