Designing Hydrologic Observatories as a Community Resource

1. Designing Hydrologic Observatories as a Community Resource Welcome to the CUAHSI National Workshop on John L. Wilson New Mexico Inst. Of Mining & Technology Chair, CUAHSI Board of Directors Logan, Utah, August 24-25, 2004

2. CUAHSI • Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science • Founded in 2001 • Mission “To foster advancements in the hydrologic sciences, in the broadest sense of that term” • Develop community agendas for research and education • Develop community resources to support research • Serve the community and society through education, outreach, and research application http://www.cuahsi.org

3. CUAHSI Mission “Identifying the resources needed to advance this agenda and facilitating the acquisition of these resources for use by the hydrologic sciences community” Resources include, but are not restricted to, physical facilities and other infrastructure.

4. Advancing Science • Significant advances in science often hinge on new observational capabilities driving process understanding and predictive capability. • Example: ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation) • “Ocean observations have always been the driver of new knowledge and predictive capabilities in the ocean and its basins.” • Opportunities in Ocean Sciences: Challenges on the Horizon, Ocean Studies Board, Commission on Geosciences, Environment, and Resources, National Research Council, 1998. NASA

5. The hydrologic science community … has identified new community-wide observational capabilities as the major resource needed to advance hydrologic science Natural laboratories or, if you prefer, hydrologic observatories provide the most important of these new capabilities.

6. There are many other NSF supported, university consortium operated,community observatories in sister sciences Astronomy Oceanography Seismology Ecology

7. AURA • Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy Hubble Peers Inside a Celestial Geode “In this unusual image, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captures a rare view of the celestial equivalent of a geode -- a gas cavity carved by the stellar wind and intense ultraviolet radiation from a hot young star.” NASA, ESA

8. AURA • Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy • Founded 1957 • (optical) astronomical observing facilities • available for use by all qualified researchers • serve the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • Gemini Observatory • National Optical Astronomy Obervatory (NOAO) • National Solar Observatory (NSO) • Space Telescope Science Institute (eg, Hubble Space Telescope) • http://www.aura-astronomy.org/

9. AURA GEMINI:Twin 8.1-meter telescopes; Hawaii's Mauna Kea & Chile's Cerro Pachon NOAO:Kitt Peak in Arizona and Cerro Tololo in Chile NSO: Sacramento Peak in New Mexico & Kitt Peak in Arizona Hubble & the planned James Webb Space Telescope

10. AUI-NRAO • Associated Universities, Inc • Operates the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) VLA witnesses a ‘cosmic crash test’: “Two normal disk galaxies collided face-on at a speed of about 500 km/sec around 50 million years ago. Their disks have already passed through each other and are now separating .” NRAO, AUI

11. AUI-NRAO • Associated Universities Inc. • AUI Founded 1946 • research, development, and education in the physical, biological and engineering sciences; Operated Brookhaven Nat’l Lab 1947-1998 • operated NRAO since 1957 • radio astronomical observing facilities • NRAO available for use by all qualified researchers • serves the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • Very Large Array (VLA) • Very Large Baseline Array (VLBA) • Green Bank Telescope • Atacama Large Millimeter Array http:// www.aui.edu http://www.nrao.edu/

12. AUI-NRAO VLA:Twenty seven movable 25m diameter antennas in a Y-shaped configuration near Socorro, NM VLBA:Ten antennas spread from the Virgin Islands, to Mauna Kea, Hawaii Atacama Large Millimeter Array: Sixty four 12-meter antennas located at an elevation of 16,400 feet in Chile Green Bank, West Virginia; world's largest (100m dia.) fully steerable single aperture antenna.

13. JOI • Joint Oceanographic Institutions • Founded ~1965 • Ocean and seafloor sediment & rock observing facilities • available for use by all qualified researchers • serves the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) • Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) • Ocean Research Interactive Observatory Networks (ORION) ODP’sJOIDES Resolution travels through the Panama Canal http://www.joiscience.org

14. IRIS • Incorporated Research Institutes for Seimology • Founded 1984 • exploring Earth's interior via collection and distribution of seismographic data • available for use by all qualified researchers • serves the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • Global Seismographic Network (GSM) • Data Management System (DMC) • PASSCAL (Instrumentation) GSN’s 128+ stations, broad band seismometers http://www.iris.edu

15. EarthScope • IRIS, UNAVCO, Stanford & others • Organized late 1990s ; Funded 2003 • investigate the structure of the North American continent and the physical processes controlling earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. • available for use by all qualified researchers • serves the community & societythrough public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (SAFOD) • US Array - Seismic • Plate Boundary Observatory (PBO) PBO arrays of Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers and strainmeters to study the three-dimensional strain field resulting from deformation across the active boundary zone between the Pacific and North American plates in the western United States. http://www.earthscope.org/

16. NOT A GOOD ORGANIZATIONAL MODEL FOR CUAHSI OBSERVATORIES LTER Network • Long Term Ecologic Research • LTER program started in 1980 • ecological processes over long temporal and broad spatial scales. • now 24 sites • not available for use by all qualified researchers • serve the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Network office established 1997 • coordinates communication, network publications, and research-planning activities Sevielleta LTER near Socorro, NM http://lternet.edu/

17. National Ecological Observatory Network Some Other Proposed Observatories • NEON • CLEANER • WSSC http://ibrcs.aibs.org/neon/index.htmlhttp://cleaner.ce.berkeley.edu/ http://www.wssc.psu.edu/

18. CUAHSI Paper prototype observatory on the Neuse River, NC • Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc • Founded 2001 • develop a predictive understanding of stores, fluxes and transformation of water, energy, sediments and nutrients • available for use by all qualified researchers • serves the community & society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information. • Facilities • Network of Five (?) Observatories • Hydrologic Information Center • Measurement Technology Facility • National Center for Hydrologic Synthesis http://www.cuahsi.org

19. An aim of this workshop is to help ensure that CUAHSI’shydrologic observatories and observatory network, … • advance the science; • are available for use by all qualified researchers • serve the science community, not the just observatory PIs; • serves the community and society through public outreach, education, and dissemination of information.

20. NSF is considering funding observatories to serve the entire hydrologic science community. CUAHSI’s hydrologic observatories and observatory network must be available for use, and be used, by qualified researchers.