The Southwest has grown hotter and drier during the past decade, and new climate data from the federal government shows these changes have been dramatic, shifting the long-term averages that represent the region’s “normal.”
The country’s updated climate “normals” were released Tuesday by the National Centers for Environmental Information, encompassing weather data for the 30-year period from 1991 through 2020. The federal government releases these long-term averages every 10 years as an up-to-date benchmark for comparing with the weather on a daily basis...