SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA Regional Hydrology IMPACTS ON REGULATORY APPROACHES FOR THE FUTURE Monitoring & Modeling
Summary This region provides a unique combination of policy issues, water quality problems, advanced technology infrastructure and multi-disciplinary scientific expertise On-going, collaborative research in this diverse range of watersheds provides an opportunity to develop a reference baseline for differently developed and managed watersheds for future management and policy
Collaborative Research Team UCSD SDSU Dr. Lihini Aluwihare Pablo J. Bryant Dr. Dan Cayan Dr. Claudia Luke Dr. Michael Dettinger Sedra Shapiro Dr. K. Georgakakos Mark Van Scoy Dr. John Helly Dr. John Largier
Initial Funding Provided by National Science Foundation San Diego Supercomputer Center High-Performance Wireless Education and Research Network (HPWREN) ROADNET County of San Diego Board of Supervisors Department of Environmental Health
Integrated Urban Hydrology
Research Goal Measure, analyze, understand the Southern California region as an integrated hydrological system across air, land, sea and, uniquely, the coast comprised of naturally occurring and engineered components Supporting science and regulatory interests for the future Starting with three watersheds in the San Diego region
Southern California has the most variable precipitation in the US Coefficient of variation for seasonal mean precipitation > 50% Partly due to the short time that the seasonal rain "window" is open Consequently, streams are very flashy and also they have a remarkable ENSO signal
Two most challenging problems in urban hydrology today are quantifying highly variable spatial distribution of precipitation at watershed scales response of urban watersheds in both their engineered and natural components
Urban watersheds contain large areas of impervious or near impervious surface co-mingle the natural and engineered drainage systems combining ravines, rivers, creeks and gullies with sewers, storm drains, levees, pumps and detention ponds. Jointly respond to storm events but are operated, managed, modified, and regulated as independent systems
Water Moves Across Scales Global Regional Local
Regional Atmospheric Air Masses Atmospheric Water Vapor in the Region from GOES 8
Regional Coastal Water Masses San Diego Bay San Diego Bay General Coastal Circulation Reflected in Sea Surface Temperature
Stormwater Loads
Representative Engineered Systems
Point and Non-Point Sources Recognized by Statute in US POINT SOURCES Wastewater effluent Runoff and leachate from waste disposal sites, animal feed lots, mines, oil fields, unsewered industrial sites Storm sewer outfalls from cities w/pop. > 100,000 Runoff from construction sites > 2 hectares Overflows of combined storm and sanitary sewers NONPOINT SOURCES Runoff from agriculture(incl. Irrigation return), pasture and range, urban (sewered and unsewered) w/pop. > 100,000 Septic leachate and runoff from failed septic systems Runoff from construction sites < 2 hectares Runoff from abandoned mines Atmospheric deposition over water surface Land-based activities generating contaminants (logging, wetland conversion, construction & development of land or waterways) from Carpenter et al, Issues in Ecology, Summer 1998
Erosion and Sediment Transport Nitrogen & Phosphorus Contamination Impacts on nutrient cycles Coastal plankton populations
TMDL: Impaired Waters in San Diego
Management Information Needs Where are contaminants coming from and where are they going? How much? How fast? How often?
How do we quantify this information?
Monitoring and Modeling Long-term, regional monitoring systems Modeling of natural and engineered systems Decision support analyses for resource management
San Diego Watersheds Santa Margarita River Relatively pristine Camp Pendleton represents federal interests San Diego River Highly urbanized Impinges Mission Bay Tijuana River Relatively unmanaged Impinges South Bay and north to at least Point Loma
Santa Margarita San Diego Tijuana
Current Research in These Watersheds Santa Margarita River Wireless monitoring systems using HPWREN (High Performance Wireless Research and Education Network) Hydrology, water quality, meteorology Spatial variability in precipitation using unique radar systems San Diego River Mission Bay monitoring and modeling Tijuana River South Bay CODAR Coastal water quality sampling
Monitoring
HPWREN connected topology agenda May 2002 Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve Pala Indian Res. Pauma Indian Res. Palomar Observatory Rincon Indian Res. San Pasqual Indian Res. La Jolla Indian Res. Mesa Grande Indian Res. Los Coyotes Indian Res. Santa Ysabel Indian Res. Mt. Laguna Observatory Backbone/relay node Science site Researcher location Education site Incident mgmt. site UCSD/SDSC SIO Scripps Pier
SMER Network Topology
High resolution still camera at SMER
Remote Sensing of Flow via Imagery - Image processing - Algorithm development
Water Quality and Quantity Sensors Developed through collaboration of StructureMetrix (nee StrainGauge) Systems San Diego Supercomputer Center HPWREN SDSU Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve StructureMetrix Funded by NGI Program State of California Office of Technology via CommerceNet
HydroMetriX small, completely self-contained system provides hydrological data from nearly any flowing water source, ranging from rivers and streams to enclosed storm drains. basic system measures flow velocity, water depth, and water temperature. data may be acquired at programmable intervals ranging from every 5 seconds to once every 10 minutes.
Wireless Real-time Flow Measurement
Modeling
Los Penasquitos Watershed Del Mar Pacific Ocean Torrey Pines
Color-code Elevation Data
Delineate Basins
Compute Routing
Overlay With Imagery DOQQ Courtesy of SANDAG
Pervious/Impervious Area Estimation Using Image Classification
Compute Intersection of Delineated Watershed and Image Mask Image subset
Analyze sub-basins Jointly or Independently
Santa Margarita River Location San Diego River Communication Instrumentation Computation
Summary This region provides a unique combination of policy issues, water quality problems, advanced technology infrastructure and multi-disciplinary scientific expertise On-going, collaborative research in this diverse range of watersheds provides an opportunity to develop a reference baseline for differently developed and managed watersheds for future management and policy