SnowClim Model

The SnowClim Model is a physics-based snow model that incorporates key energy balance processes necessary for capturing snowpack spatiotemporal variability, including under future climate scenarios, while optimizing computational efficiency through several empirical simplifications. The SnowClim Model is specifically designed for energy balance snow modeling at high spatial resolutions over large domains.

The model is written in MATLAB (R2020b). The model code can be downloaded below or run in the cloud through HydroShare by clicking the 'Open With' button above and selecting MATLAB Online. The code run_snowclim_model.m describes how to set parameters, import climate forcing data, run the model, and plot a few model outputs. This code uses default parameter values and the example climate forcing data found in /example_forcings but can be modified for new applications.

Additional details regarding the SnowClim model physics and application to the western US are available in:
Lute, A. C., Abatzoglou, J., and Link, T.: SnowClim v1.0: high-resolution snow model and data for the western United States, Geosci. Model Dev., 15, 5045–5071, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-5045-2022, 2022.

Climate and snow data from application of the SnowClim model to the western US under pre-industrial, present-day, and future time periods can be found here:
https://www.hydroshare.org/resource/acc4f39ad6924a78811750043d59e5d0/