GEOSS ADC Architecture Workshop Water/Drought Scenario 5 Feb 2008

1. GEOSS ADC Architecture WorkshopWater/Drought Scenario5 Feb 2008 David Arctur OGC Interoperability Institute darctur@ogcii.org

2. Drought Monitoring and Response • Drought: an increasingly damaging phenomena • Growing population & agricultural stresses on surface & groundwater • Reduced snow and glacier reservoirs • Complex phenomena • Defined across many time scales, impacting many economic sectors • Sea surface temperatures (SST), winds, land cover, many other factors • Scenario objectives • Monitor & forecast drought indicators • Assess water and drought conditions and impacts • Plan for mitigation • Carry out response strategy • Consider and address multi-disciplinary and cross-border institutional communications and coordination

3. Actors • Consumers • Residential, commercial, industrial, agricultural • Local officials • City managers, county managers • Agency officials and staff • State Natural Resource Department decision/policy makers • State and Federal agency water managers • (USA) Army Corps of Engineers • GEOSS portal integrator

4. Information available before scenario - 1 • Example regions of interest • Near-term: Southeastern USA (NIDIS data and capabilities) • Longer-term: Pacific Basin (Americas, Australia, Pacific Islands) • Framework geographical datasets • Roadways, landcover, hydrography • Locations of major agricultural production, industrial centers, and urban areas with high water resource demands • Gazetteer and locations for built-up areas, with linked population figures • Digital terrain/elevation model • Orthophotography or satellite imagery

5. Information available before scenario - 2 • Environmental data • Precipitation  • Soil moisture indices • Drought indicators • Palmer Indices • SPI (standard precipitation index) • VHI (vegetation health index) • SWSI (surface water supply index) • Snow water content and snow depth • Streamflow, lake and reservoir levels, and groundwater status • Soil and air temperature • Humidity • Wind speed and direction • Solar radiation

6. Specific processing capabilities • Monthly and seasonal forecasting of temperatures and precipitation; anomalies (greater/lesser than normal) 12 months in advance (example source: NWS Climate Prediction Center) • Assessment of current water conditions (precipitation, ground water, USDM indices, water monitor network, many products) • Drought 3-month outlook (USDM subjectively derived) • Drought impacts monitoring system with impacts database, analysis tools and practices • Determination of drought triggers: threshold values of an indicator that distinguish drought magnitude and determine when management actions should begin and end • PDI or USDM triggers result in actions taken by state and local managers; generally locally/regionally determined, not national • In the US, Army Corps of Engineers may respond to triggers

7. GUI development, GEOSS portal integration • Data discovery tools: portal (GUI) & clearinghouse (harvester) • For community data sources (metadata) to be harvestable, metadata server needs to support CSW • If community data sources support standard WMS, WCS, WFS, SOS, etc. services, the portal can preview and access the actual datasets; otherwise it will simply refer user to remote server • Integration with OPeNDAP should be considered • Data viewer client: within the portal, Google Earth, etc. • Drought research community “adopts” the portal • Community-managed web UI – wiki, journals, pre-defined and derived maps • Build and save projects; add new data as it emerges • Help support cross-cutting, multi-disciplinary applications

8. Institutional coordination WMO, CEOS, IGOS/IGWCO, GCOS, GEWEX NIDIS (US National Integrated Drought Information System) NADM, USDM (N.American/US Drought Monitor) FEWS (Famine Early Warning Sysem) Drought Management Center of Southeastern Europe HARON (Hydrological Applications and Run-Off Network) NCAR (US National Center for Atmospheric Research) Plus many others as potential collaborators – see National Drought Mitigation Center International Activities

9. 2007 GEO Plenary and Ministerial Summit: Drought Early Warning System (DEWS) • Required Areas of Expertise • Drought Monitoring • Forecasting • Impacts Monitoring and Assessment • Near-term Priorities • Develop a Task within the GEO Work Plan • Summer 08: Convene a meeting of technical leadership to identify needs and priorities (Hosted by the IDEA Center in Hawaii) • Research • Education • Planning

10. Prerequisites for demonstration participation Necessary capacity at national level: • Current drought monitoring capabilities and practices • Observational data network activities, capabilities, and resources • Drought forecasting • Drought response • Current potential level of participation in global network • What is needed for them to reach their desired level of participation • May have different levels of participation depending on variations in countries’ capabilities and desires

11. Next Steps • Work with likely participants to identify case studies • NIDIS Portal team working on Southeast US drought response (near term) • Broader drought science community trying to build capacity among developing countries & islands in Pacific Basin to support DEWS (longer term) • Others…?