Grantee Research Project Results
Vulnerability Assessment of San Joaquin Basin Water Supply, Ecological Resources, and Rural Economy Due to Climate Variability and Extreme Weather Events
EPA Grant Number: R827448Title: Vulnerability Assessment of San Joaquin Basin Water Supply, Ecological Resources, and Rural Economy Due to Climate Variability and Extreme Weather Events
Investigators: Dracup, John A. , Grober, Leslie , Howitt, Richard , Oswald, William
Current Investigators: Dracup, John A. , Grober, Leslie , Howitt, Richard , Brekke, L. D. , Bashford, K. E. , Hidalgo, H. G. , Miller, N. L. , Hatchett, Stephen P , Quinn, Nigel
Institution: University of California - Berkeley , University of California - Los Angeles , Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board , University of California - Davis
Current Institution: University of California - Berkeley , California EPA Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board , University of California - Davis
EPA Project Officer: Packard, Benjamin H
Project Period: July 1, 1999 through June 30, 2002 (Extended to June 30, 2003)
Project Amount: $859,654
RFA: Integrated Assessment of the Consequences of Climate Change (1999) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Climate Change , Ecological Indicators/Assessment/Restoration , Water , Aquatic Ecosystems
Description:
Proposed herein is a collaborative research project with two main objectives: (1) To assess the vulnerability of water supply, water demand, water quality, ecosystem health, and socioeconomic welfare within the San Joaquin River Basin as a function of climate variability and extreme weather events; (2) To provide guidance in the formulation of effective management strategies to mitigate the range of potential impacts due to climate variability and extreme weather.
There are several compelling reasons for updating and advancing previous studies on climate change in California. First, the proposed study will use new model output with fine-scale (12 km and sub-basin area averaged) resolution initialized and forced with new GCM output. Second, the proposed study is an integrated analysis of the impacts of climate change/variability on the resources of the San Joaquin River basin. The previous study focused only on the water resource impacts due to climate change/variability. Third, this study will focus on a user product and provide assistance to CALFED (a joint California State and Federal program designed to resolve water issues in Northern California) in important water quality and ecosystem management of the sub-region.
Approach:
An integrated modeling and analysis approach will be adopted in performing the vulnerability assessment phase of our proposed study. The criteria used in selecting models for this study are: (a) general acceptance of models by the user community; (b) specificity of model data and scale to describe conditions in the San Joaquin River Basin; (c) model codes are all in the public domain.
The modeling and analysis approach is broken out into six linked components: (1) weather and climate, (2) water supply allocation and streamflow, (3) agricultural production and management, (4) water quality, (5) fish ecology, and (6) socioeconomic impacts. Each of these model and monitoring systems are discussed in the proposal.
Expected Results:
The principal expected benefit of the work proposed is a better assessment of the San Joaquin Valley Sub-Region to climate variability and extreme events. Our partnerships with key water and ecosystem managers in the San Joaquin Valley will enable effective and rapid utilization of future planning and provide assistance to the CALFED Program.
We will provide San Joaquin Valley managers and planners with our fully integrated decision support system (DSS). The DSS will be used to conduct further evaluations of the impacts of climate variability and extreme events and to develop approaches for the mitigation of potential impacts. A user friendly compact disk toolbox and user manual will be developed as part of this EPA study. The DSS is being designed with minimal time required for file manipulation to formulate impact response scenarios. The DSS should allow the analyst to assess the utility of interventions such as reservoir reoperation, real-time water quality management and adaptive management of fishery resources in mitigating some of the potential impacts of global climatic change and variability hence reducing the vulnerability of the existing system to permanent damage. Training of the resulting DSS system will be provided to planners, operations analysts, and other users.
Publications and Presentations:
Publications have been submitted on this project: View all 21 publications for this projectJournal Articles:
Journal Articles have been submitted on this project: View all 4 journal articles for this projectSupplemental Keywords:
watersheds, discharge, ecosystem, decision-making, socio-economic, hydrology, climate models, California (CA)., RFA, Scientific Discipline, Air, Geographic Area, Ecosystem Protection/Environmental Exposure & Risk, Hydrology, Ecology, Environmental Chemistry, Ecosystem/Assessment/Indicators, Ecosystem Protection, climate change, State, Economics, Ecological Risk Assessment, risk assessment, water resources, environmental monitoring, fish habitat, extreme weather events, San Joaguin Basin, economic models, hydrologic models, socioeconomic indicators, climate models, San Joaquin, agriculture, environmental stressors, vulnerability assessment, water quality, California (CA), climate variabilityProgress and Final Reports:
The perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.