The City of Florence, local stakeholders, and partner agencies recently formed the Siuslaw Estuary Partnership (SEP) to address threats to drinking water quality and fish and wildlife habitat in the lower Siuslaw watershed. The Sole Source Dunal Aquifer within the lower Siuslaw watershed, which supplies the City ’s drinking water,...
The presentation discusses the economic value of Ensemble Streamflow Predictions (ESP) streamflow and energy price forecasts in the operation of the Jackson Hydropower Project in western Washington. A decision support system (DSS) was constructed for this multipurpose reservoir system for the evaluation of operational alternatives and improvement of operational procedures....
The Joint Water Commission (JWC) in Forest Grove, Oregon completed a greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory of all the direct and indirect emissions associated with the daily operations of its 75 MGD conventional water treatment plant. Currently, very few water and wastewater facilities have completed a greenhouse gas inventory to date....
The inter-relationships of vegetation, soils, and stream channel erosion characteristics were examined in two riparian meadows of the Ochoco National Forest where progressive stream headcut incision is a critical resource management issue and restoration priority. Scientific literature establishes that headcut incision leads to lower groundwater tables, with corresponding shifts in...
River flooding is a recurrent threat and its control and management continues to be a challenge. It has been recognized that effective flooding control requires a real-time strategy that combines optimization with a physically-based simulation model. Current real-time frameworks that combine simulation and optimization have two main drawbacks. The first...
The Columbia River Treaty has been in effect for over 45 years, but its future is uncertain. Starting in 2014, Canada and the United States will have the opportunity to announce ten years’ notice for termination of the current arrangement. As this artificial deadline approaches, stakeholders are working to determine...
Climate change will continue to profoundly affect water supply and aquatic ecosystems in the Pacific Northwest. Changes such as warmer air temperatures, increases in the proportion of winter rain versus snow, reduced spring snowpack, and earlier snowmelt all affect streamflow. The response to these climate impacts includes earlier runoff peaks,...
Drought events are usually characterized by their duration, severity, and intensity which are calculated based on different indices for drought recognition. Streamflow Drought Index (SDI) used in hydrological droughts is applied in this study to calculate drought variables of historical events in Upper Klamath River basin in Oregon. Historical extreme...
One important aspect related to the management of water resources under future climate variation is the occurrence of extreme precipitation events. In order to prepare for extreme events, namely floods and droughts, it is important to understand how future climate variability will influence the occurrence of such events. Recent advancements...
Effects of climate change in the Cascade Range will likely include more rain, less snow, and earlier snowmelt in the Cascade Range as compared to present conditions. These changes, in turn, will affect the timing of runoff, groundwater recharge, and groundwater discharge to spring-fed streams. This hydrologic response needs to...
In January 2008, the Georgia Water Council approved the Georgia Comprehensive State-Wide Water Management Plan (GA Water Plan). The purpose of GA Water Plan is to guide the state of Georgia with managing its water resources in a sustainable manner. This means not only allowing growth in Georgia, but also...
Pesticides are widely used to control undesirable pests and may be applied directly to water or lands directly adjacent to water. Pesticides are an option for habitat restoration but there can be unintended consequences to native, threatened and endangered species. There is very little information on the impacts of pesticides...
The City of Damascus, Oregon has a current population of nearly 10,000 people and expects to grow to 50,000 residents by 2060. On the eastern edge of the Portland metropolitan area, the City is located in the Clackamas and Willamette basins with an area of almost 12,000 acres. Semi-rural in...
The Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement (KBRA) and the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement (KHSA) forged between Klamath River Basin stakeholder groups in California and Oregon, when successfully implemented, will lead to the largest dam removal project in history. After a decade of intense legal and social conflict among disparate interests in...
The western slope of the Oregon Cascades receives up to 3500 mm of precipitation annually, with a majority falling between the months of November-March. In this maritime climate, the partitioning of precipitation between rain and snow is highly sensitive to temperature. Climate models generally agree that winter temperatures in the...
The specter of climate change looms large over Oregon. Although hydroclimatologic models predict a warmer Oregon, the total volume of precipitation may not change significantly. However, the character (rain vs. snow) and spatial and temporal distributions of precipitation will likely change. The state is already witnessing earlier snowmelt in the...
Water related ecosystem services (WES), such as flow regulation, drinking water supply, temperature regulation, and water recreational activities, are affected by anthropogenic climate change. Forecasting potential shifts in such WES is critical to identifying the form and magnitude of likely impacts. We quantified the levels and values of WES under...
Climate change due to global warming could induce more frequent droughts in the Willamette River Basin because less snowfall in winter and earlier snowmelt due to temperature increase may lead to decreases in spring and summer streamflow. This study examines possible changes in drought risk using two drought indices, Standardized...
Climate changes. That’s what climate does. It is a natural and dynamic process. The National Weather Service (NWS) recognizes on-going climate change by publishing new figures for average climate every ten years. Climate averages for precipitation, temperature, and other weather parameters are computed on a 30 year basis but only...
There is reasonable expectation that climate warming will accelerate the hydrologic cycle, resulting in greater evapotranspiration (ET) and reduced groundwater recharge (R) (or stream flow). Though qualitatively intuitive, quantifying these potential shifts in water budget partitioning is a contemporary challenge in hydrology, because the linkage between ET and R is...