Middle Chattahoochee Middle Chattahoochee and Flint River Basins and Flint River Basins

NIDIS System NIDIS System Development WorkshopDevelopment Workshop

Breakout Session

May 18, 2010

Victor Murphy-NWS Southern Region

Information NeedsInformation Needs

• What are the critical information needs related to drought (e.g. gaps in monitoring and forecasting)?

• Feedback from earlier meetings has identified the following needs. Are there more?

Information NeedsInformation Needs

• County level precipitation data, preferably with a spatial characterization with land use underlain.

• Ensemble Streamflow Prediction (ESP) hydrologic forecasts.

• New CPC or RFC forecasts.

• Soil moisture sensors.

Information NeedsInformation Needs

• An end to end cataloguing of water resources and water users to facilitate contingency plans.

• Additional USGS stream gauges and monitoring and maintenance of such.

• Evaporation Data. Is there skill in doing this remotely?

Information NeedsInformation Needs

• A multi-state drought mitigation plan.

• COE working with states and stakeholders to update the current water management plan.

• Creation of a new product along the lines of “…if no precipitation falls during the next 2 weeks, conditions will look like this….”.

Effectiveness of Effectiveness of Existing Drought Existing Drought Indicators and Indicators and

Management TriggersManagement Triggers• Time lag between drought and

response in aquifer is variable and rate of decline increases with length and severity of drought.

Effectiveness of Effectiveness of Existing Drought Existing Drought Indicators and Indicators and

Management TriggersManagement Triggers• Additional well data. • Comprehensive watershed management.• A central clearing house for the needs of

stakeholders with in-stream/non-consumptive flow requirements (i.e. those stakeholders who require a particular flow rate for operations to take place or for species and industry to thrive.

• Creating a method to determine a real-time inventory of water demand by users.

Effectiveness of Effectiveness of Existing Drought Existing Drought Indicators and Indicators and

Management TriggersManagement Triggers• How is ground water flow into the river

systems measured?• Do programs like the Flint River Drought

Protection Act work? Can responsible scientific entities assist in making informed regional precipitation forecasts at the appropriate time?

How can Education, How can Education, Communication, and Communication, and

Transparency be ImprovedTransparency be Improved• Drought discussion board on the

NIDIS portal.

• Creation of a regional team for US Drought Monitor updates. This could be the precursor to a multi-state drought plan with triggers.

How can Education, How can Education, Communication, and Communication, and

Transparency be ImprovedTransparency be Improved• Suite of decision support tools for

local and state users. This must provide value and added info for all sectors (ag,rec, water management, commercial, and other sectors).

• Amount of withdrawals by agriculture, city of Atlanta, and power users must be available in one stop location.

• USFWS Participation?

How Can Education, How Can Education, Communication, and Communication, and

Transparency be ImprovedTransparency be Improved• Monitoring the impact of center pivot wells

that are used for agriculture. These can change direction of ground water flow.

• Efforts must be intensified to provide incentives to retrofit irrigation systems in order to conserve water.

• State drought plans.• www.georgiawaterplanning.org• State of GA working on a statewide water

inventory for public use. Timeframe?

Increasing Threat of Increasing Threat of La Nina Conditions La Nina Conditions

this Fall/Winterthis Fall/Winter

Latest NOAA CFS Latest NOAA CFS Precip Forecast Precip Forecast

CPC Precip Outlook CPC Precip Outlook for Dec/Jan/Febfor Dec/Jan/Feb

www.srh.noaa.gov/ridge2/www.srh.noaa.gov/ridge2/RFC_Precip_test/RFC_Precip_test/

precip_analysis.phpprecip_analysis.php

SCIPP Drought IndexSCIPP Drought Index