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In the western United States, more than 79 000 km2 has been converted to irrigated agriculture and urban areas. These changes have the potential to alter surface temperature by modifying the energy budget at the land–atmosphere interface. This study reports the seasonally varying temperature responses of four regional climate models (RCMs) – RSM, RegCM3, MM5-CLM3, and DRCM – to conversion of potential natural vegetation to modern land-cover and land-use over a 1-year period. Three of the RCMs supplemented soil moisture, producing large decreases in the August mean (− 1.4 to − 3.1 °C) and maximum (− 2.9 to − 6.1 °C) 2-m air temperatures where natural vegetation was converted to irrigated agriculture. Conversion to...