Snowy Scenes Will Return This Week

We have one more day of calm weather before things get a bit more interesting heading into the week. Sunday will feature mainly cloudy skies with morning temperatures in the 20s and highs in the mid-30s. It'll be a touch breezy at times, with west-southwest winds up to 15 mph.

We will watch the potential for some morning snow showers in northern parts of the state, otherwise, a mainly cloudy day is expected for many locations. Highs will range from the teens in northwestern Minnesota to the 30s down south.

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Forecast loop Monday from Midnight to 6 PM

The first blip toward snowier weather comes through in the form of a clipper for Presidents' Day Monday. Snow with this system will generally favor areas along and north of I-94, with the most concentrated (therefore heaviest) snow expected in northern Minnesota.

Areas from Fargo and Grand Forks to the North Shore could easily pick up 2-5" of snow with this system as it rolls on through. Snow totals will taper the farther south you go, with around an inch possible for the metro.

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Meanwhile, a potentially potent system is on deck in the Tuesday-Thursday timeframe, especially across central and southern Minnesota. This system would likely come in a few phases.

It is still way too early for potential snow totals, but models have been consistent that this could be a high-impact, long-duration storm across the region with - at the low end - several inches of snow possible. If it comes to fruition as models are indicating (which, taken with a grain of salt this far out), there's the potential of double-digit snow totals in central and southern Minnesota spread out over approximately 2.5-3 days.

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Snowy Scenes Will Return This Week
By D.J. Kayser, filling in for Paul Douglas

For winter outdoor recreators, this week's rain (and the recent warmer weather) has taken its toll on trails across many areas of the state. The Minnesota DNR reports many trails that are in poor to fair conditions for skiing due to icy conditions - and some can't even be regroomed at the moment. However, there's still plenty of snow out there, with over 30" on the ground in parts of the Arrowhead.

However, a potentially potent system is on deck in the Tuesday-Thursday timeframe. While the system is still several days out, models have been consistent on something heavy transpiring. The last time MSP saw a single day with 2"+ of snow was back on January 27 (2.2"), so you may want to dust off those shovels and snow blowers in advance of a return to snowier weather!

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D.J.'s Extended Twin Cities Forecast

SUNDAY: Cloudy and calm. Wake up 26. High 35. Chance of precipitation 0%. Wind NW 5-15 mph.

MONDAY: Breezy. Presidents' Day clipper. Wake up 15. High 35. Chance of precipitation 80%. Wind SW 10-20 mph.

WEDNESDAY: Snow continues across southern MN. Wake up 15. High 22. Chance of precipitation 90%. Wind NW 15-25 mph.

THURSDAY: Heavy plowable snow likely. Windy. Wake up 9. High 18. Chance of precipitation 90%. Wind NW 15-25 mph.

FRIDAY: More sun than clouds. Late night snow? Wake up -5. High 14. Chance of precipitation 30%. Wind SW 5-10 mph.

SATURDAY: Decreasing clouds. Warming back up. Wake up 7. High 24. Chance of precipitation 20%. Wind SW 5-10 mph.

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*Length Of Day: 10 hours, 38 minutes, and 38 seconds
*Daylight GAINED Since Yesterday: 2 minutes and 59 seconds

*When do we see 11 Hours of Daylight?: February 27th (11 hours, 2 minutes, 59 seconds)
*When is Sunrise at/before 7:00 AM?: February 24th (6:59 AM)
*When is Sunset at/after 6:00 PM?: March 1st (6:00 PM)

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This Day in Weather History
February 19th

1928: A dust storm moves across Minnesota, causing lights to be turned on in the daytime in the Twin Cities.

On Sunday, we will watch the potential for some snowy weather across the northern tier of the country from the Pacific Northwest to the Great Lakes. Some showers will also be possible in the Southwest and in select areas of the East Coast.

The heaviest snow through Monday will be in the Northwest, where parts of the Cascades and Northern Rockies could see several feet of snow. Rainfall amounts will generally be under 2" where rain does fall.

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Homes in flood zones are overvalued by billions, study finds

More from Grist: "American homes in flood zones are overvalued by hundreds of billions of dollars, according to a study published on Thursday in the journal Nature Climate Change. Low-income homeowners in states controlled by Republicans are especially at risk of seeing their home values deflate as global warming accelerates. Flooding is a costly and deadly natural hazard across the United States. For decades, the Federal Emergency Management Agency offered flood insurance at discounted rates, incentivizing developers to build houses in flood-prone areas. The agency's flood maps are also notoriously outdated. That has led to a dangerous situation for homeowners as they grapple with year after year of debilitating floods. The study, published by a group of academic, nonprofit, and government organizations that include the Environmental Defense Fund and the Federal Reserve, revealed that homes in flood zones are overvalued by as much as $237 billion."

More from the Star Tribune: "A Minnesota oil refinery is one of the industry's biggest emitters of a mineral that can harm fish, releasing it in wastewater bound for the Mississippi River, according to a recent report. The analysis done by the nonprofit environmental watchdog Environmental Integrity Project points out the Pine Bend refinery in Rosemount as the fourth-biggest source of selenium in wastewater among U.S. oil processors. The element can accumulate in the bodies of aquatic animals and build up through the food web. Coal-burning power plants are limited in how much selenium they can release into rivers, but not oil refiners, said Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project."

FERC approves power plant rules to fight extreme weather

More from E&E News: "The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved new rules Thursday to help protect the electricity system during severe winter weather, but grid experts said more action is needed to prevent deadly power outages like those that occurred during Winter Storm Uri. Proposed by the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC), the new reliability standards come two years after the February 2021 storm caused millions of people in Texas to lose power in below-freezing temperatures. More than 200 people died, some from freezing in their homes. Under the new rules, which FERC approved in a unanimous decision, U.S. generation owners will need to protect power plants from freezing and develop enhanced cold weather preparedness plans, among other measures."

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- D.J. Kayser