Extreme Precipitation and Atmospheric Rivers
Ocean-atmosphere interactions over sub-tropical pacific have important implications with regards to flooding and precipitation patterns in the Western U.S. This research project is documenting the importance of these ocean-atmosphere processes with regards to snow accumulation and water supply.
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California Department of Water Resources
The California Department of Water Resources is responsible for issuing forecasts of streamflow volume for 20 major river basins across the state. However, in addition to a declining snowpack in the Western U.S., the statistical models used in water forecasting are subject to significant error and are causing significant management challenges in California. This research project address these impediments through real-time integration of MODIS-based SWE estimates into water supply forecast models.
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Snowmelt Perturbations
At higher elevations in the western U.S., seasonal snow accumulation provides the primary source of water input to the terrestrial ecosystem and 60 million people. Recent changes in climate and vegetation cover (e.g. fire suppression, bark beetle infestation, fire) have potentially large, yet unrealized implications for water availability and ecosystem health. This project investigates the effect of these perturbations on streamflow generation, providing water resource managers guidance as to how operational water supply forecast models may need to be augmented to account for changes in runoff production.
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WWA Snow Workshops for Stakeholders
From the perspective of those who depend on snowpack for water, snowpack monitoring is drought monitoring. Improving the use of snowpack monitoring data will help forecasters and water managers make more accurate predictions in regards to drought and flood conditions. The CIRES Western Water Assessment (WWA) and CWEST co-hosts workshops intended to improve the usability of snowpack monitoring information in the Rocky Mountain West, with a view to enhancing that monitoring with new technologies.
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Real-Time Snowpack Estimation from Satellite
This project estimates snowpack and streamflow conditions in the Colorado headwaters. The overall goal is to develop a Snow Water Equivalent (SWE) monitoring technique that can leverage both point scale measurements and a spatially explicit patterns of SWE from remote sensing in near real-time.
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Error Analysis of MODIS Snow Data
The need for better assessment of the snow covered resources in mountain areas has been made available through new NASA Earth System Data Records using MODIS data. This data’s use in snowmelt models and reservoir operations will be significantly advanced by this investigation, which would validate the products, analyze the structure of errors, and advise users of caveats and likely accuracy.
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Water Sustainability and Climate
For 60 million people in the Western U.S., understanding the impacts of climate change on water sustainability, which is inherently linked with mountain snowpack and snowmelt timing, is crucial to sustaining agriculture and municipal water demands. This project investigates the climate-snow-ecosystem feedbacks to identify how climate and land cover perturbations impact the operational procedures and legal agreements associated with water allocations and trans-basin diversions.
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Analysis of Agricultural Water Supply-Demand Imbalance
The recent (2012-2015) California drought significantly reduced natural water storage in the Sierra Nevada snowpack leading to significant water supply-demand imbalances that have had profound agricultural, economic and societal impacts. CU Boulder and the California Department of Water Resources are working together to analyze satellite data to document water supply-demand imbalances and the tipping points associated with land use changes. Project plans are to provide water managers with new tools for mitigating the impacts of long-term drought.
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