I wasn't sure where to post this because since the issue in question covers only a very small part of the UK, I didn't feel that it was worthwhile starting a new thread for that, so I have decided that this thread probably comes the closest to being the most relevant place for it.
Anyway, those of you who have been reading my reports on this thread will know that in this part of the world, we have not been getting as much rain as what the rest of the UK has been getting during this month, despite the fact that our rainfall totals during this month so far have been no worse than average. To that end, I have found SEPA's latest version of their water scarcity report for the east of Scotland which was released on 29 November 2018, and which can be read here.
November was a slightly wetter than average month here and because of that, groundwater levels have showed a little bit of a recovery here in the east of Scotland during that time. Since the autumn as a whole was drier than average though, the groundwater levels here remain at a very low level and although this hasn't been causing any problems for the public water supply, this has caused a few issues with a number of private water supplies according to that report which shows that large parts of the east of Scotland including here in Edinburgh, remain on a water scarcity alert as a result.
This report then goes on to tell us that the winter rainfall patterns will be crucial to how groundwater levels recover from here, as we will need to be seeing quite a lot of rainfall during this time in order for that to properly happen, If we were getting the same amount of rain here during this month so far as what the rest of the UK was getting, there would be no problems here because the rainfall deficit would be getting made up, and the resulting recovery in groundwater levels would be well underway because of that.
The fact that we are getting no more than average rainfall at the moment though means that this just isn't happening. The outlook on the report points to this winter being slightly wetter than average, but that is based on a scenario where the Atlantic jet stream is too powerful to allow the Scandinavian High to properly build. However, there are now some indications in the models that the Scandinavian High could actually be a bit stronger than anticipated especially if we get a SSW event at some time around Christmas in the way that the models are indicating just now and if that happens, the general outlook will then be drier overall than what was previously expected,.
This could then make for very worrying times ahead for this region in terms of those all important groundwater levels and so, I am hoping that people will bear this in mind and spare a thought for what is happening here, before they complain about getting too much rain in their own neck of the woods.
Edited by user
10 December 2018 00:21:53
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Reason: Not specified
The north of Edinburgh, usually always missing out on snow events which occur not just within the rest of Scotland or the UK, but also within the rest of Edinburgh.