FIMI and USGS Mission Areas

FIMI and USGS Mission Areas • Natural Hazards • Water • Ecosystems • Climate and Land Use Change • Core Sciences

Natural Hazards and FIMI • Expand & modernize hazards technology • Develop models with robust predictive capability to support emergency mgmt. • Develop a core of USGS and partner researchers focusing on vulnerability science • Develop a national risk-monitoring program • Develop new ways of communicating hazards and hazard assessments

Hazards - Inundation Mapping as a Tool for: • Flood Preparedness • “What-if” scenarios • Flood Response • Tied to gage & forecast data • Flood Recovery • Damage assessment • HAZUS-MH • Flood Mitigation & Planning • Flood risk analyses

Water • Ties interpretive products to the USGS streamgage network. • Relies upon expertise & innovation from Water scientists to use network resources, geospatial data, & hydraulic models to build maps.

Ecosystems • Floodplains are riparian zones that can support rich ecosystems, both in quantity and diversity. • A floodplain can contain 100 or even 1000 times as many species as a river. • Many species are specific to floodplains e.g. trees that grow in floodplains tend to be very tolerant of root disturbance very quick-growing, compared to non-riparian trees.

Ecosytems • Floodplain restoration - fully or partially restoring a floodplain to a natural condition e.g. levee removal • Objectives of restoring floodplains include • increased storage for flood impact mitigation • restoration of habitat for aquatic & riparian species • improvement of water quality • increased recharge of groundwater.

Example: NRCS Wetland Reserve Program • Before a site on farm land can be designated as a wetland for restoration, several criteria must be met including evidence of being in a zone prone to sustained or frequent flooding conditions for a period of 7 consecutive days, at least once every 2 years on average, during the growing season. • Combines USGS streamgage data with inundation mapping

Helps WRP meet intended benefits of restoring riparian wetlands: • increased protection and improvement of water quality • lessened peak flood stream flows • increased recharge of ground water • increased protection and enhancement of open space and aesthetic quality • increased protection of native flora and fauna U.S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Services, 2002, Restoring America’s Wetland: The Wetlands Reserve Program, 8p, (http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/programs/wrp/pdfs/wrpweb.pdf

Example Enbridge Oil Spill • July 26, 2010 - 800,000 gallons of crude oil spilled into Talmadge Creek, a tributary of the Kalamazoo River. • Spill coincided with a flood (.04% chance, 25-yr.) • Flood inundation maps made for remediation of floodplain sediment and vegetation & to identify potential re-deposition areas • FIMI pilot project http://water.usgs.gov/osw/flood_inundation/projects/kalamazoo/

Ecosystems • What other riparian/floodplain ecosystem applications can add value to FIMI products? USGS Nebraska Water Science Center, Cardwell Branch Watershed Assessment, http://ne.water.usgs.gov/projects/cardwell.html

Climate Change Incorporating climate projection information into flood-risk evaluations: Properly evaluating future flood risk within a changing climate remains a goal of water-management decisionmakers. Changes in temperature and precipitation would conceptually affect the characterization of flood-frequency distributions in a given region. --Climate Change and Water Resources Management: A Federal Perspective, USGS Circular 1331

Climate Change and Floods -- Stationarity: Is the idea that natural systems fluctuate within an unchanging envelope of variability Has been a foundation of flood studies and design – e.g. 1% chance flood mapping Has long been compromised by human disturbance in watersheds Is compromised by externally forced, natural climate changes and low-frequency, internal variability Milly and others, 2008, Stationarity Is Dead: Whither Water Management?, in Science Vol. 319 no. 5863 pp. 573-574 http://www.waterandclimate.org/UserFiles/File/WWW2009_milly_et_al.pdf

Climate Change • Alternative probabilistic techniques allow for nonstationarity in flood event distributions.1 • Simulated hydrologic projections consistent with climate projections might be used to guide meteorological assumptions feeding into probable maximum precipitation estimates (many uncertainties, however). 1 • USGS FIMI flood map products are not tied to probabilities, but to streamflows – useful for flood risk analyses NOT tied to stationarity 1Climate Change and Water Resources Management: A Federal Perspective, USGS Circular 1331

Land Use Change Example Washington State: Newaukum Creek is a rural mostly forested watershed with of a similar size to Mercer Creek, a nearby rapidly urbanizing watershed Konrad, C.P., Effects of Urban Development of Floods, USGS Fact Sheet 076-03 http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs07603/

Same storm, similar size watersheds, faster & higher flood peak Given the same channel and floodplain geometry, greater inundation from Mercer Creek would result from a given storm Konrad, C.P., Effects of Urban Development of Floods, USGS Fact Sheet 076-03 http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/fs07603/

Climate and Land Use Change • Climate effects + land use effects + resulting changes in channel and overbank geometry = changes in flood characteristics & hence risk • How can application to CLU issues add value to FIMI products?

Core Sciences Interoperability – making USGS science data and information more relevant by being deliverable across many platforms

FIMI File Formats that accompany an approved SIM library Interoperable through widely accepted file formats & metadata: • GIS • All spatial files and FGDC compliant metadata • KML/KMZ • PDF/JPG print products • GeoReferenced

Interoperability = increased relevance for FIMI science products Useable NOW for many outlets and applications • AHPS • HAZUS • Google Map • SAGE • USGS Web Mapping Application • National Map • FLEX viewers • Mobile Apps

Fits Integrated Water Resources Science and Services (IWRSS) INTEROPERABILITY THEME TEAM Purpose: • address issues related to system interoperability and data synchronization, • work toward seamless and cross-functional water resources decision support systems – a common operating picture, and • provide oversight and guidance to subordinate Technical Working Groups that are formed to address specific interoperability related issues.

INTEROPERABILITY THEME TEAM Outcomes: • Internal operating efficiency will increase, and risk will decrease, as a result of improved interoperability/synchronization and reduction in effort, tools and applications necessary to exchange data and information. • There will be enhanced continuity of operations by facilitating and providing mechanisms for backup, beneficial redundancies, and failover.

INTEROPERABILITY THEME TEAM Outcomes: • There will be faster implementation of new tools across the enterprise, with an associated reduction in implementation costs. • Both internal and external stakeholder satisfaction will increase as a result of improved operational communication, coordination, and collaboration

FIMI and USGS Mission Areas