ABSTRACT This study evaluates the water intensity of thermoelectric power plants in the eleven We... more ABSTRACT This study evaluates the water intensity of thermoelectric power plants in the eleven Western states included within the Western Electricity Coordinating Council region. Water intensities are combined with retail electricity sales using an embedded resource accounting framework to estimate a value intensity of water embedded in electrical energy production and trade in the Western U.S. States with lower water intensities and higher retail electricity prices tend to be net importers of electricity and have the highest value intensities. A 35% increase in the value intensity of water embedded in electricity traded in export was shown to have occurred relative to electricity produced for in-state use. This increase in the value intensity of embedded water suggests that embedded water in the electricity trade has already emerged as a substitute for direct trade in water resources, and that this trade is organized in a manner that appears to benefit both importing and exporting parties.
The objective of this project is to develop and test a prototype community cyberinfrastructure (C... more The objective of this project is to develop and test a prototype community cyberinfrastructure (CI) for research, education and outreach in hydrology. The proposed CI, called WaterHUB, is based on the well established HUBZero infrastructure at Purdue University with capabilities for community building sharing data and modeling tools in an interactive environment. Initial development of WaterHUB is guided by research questions related to hydrologic data management, quantifying hydrologic fluxes, flow paths and storages in watersheds. Simple analysis tools are being developed to ingest public domain geospatial and temporal data, including observations data provided by the CUAHSI HIS web services. Similarly, a community environment for sharing and evaluating hydrology curriculum is being developed. The educational component of the project involves a platform for curriculum module development, sharing of software tools, input/output datasets and multimedia resources. The module developm...
Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 2015
Physical mechanisms of incongruency between observations and Weather Research and Forecasting (WR... more Physical mechanisms of incongruency between observations and Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model predictions are examined. Limitations of evaluation are constrained by (i) parameterizations of model physics, (ii) parameterizations of input data, (iii) model resolution, and (iv) flux observation resolution. Observations from a new 22.1-m flux tower situated within a residential neighborhood in Phoenix, Arizona, are utilized to evaluate the ability of the urbanized WRF to resolve finescale surface energy balance (SEB) when using the urban classes derived from the 30-m-resolution National Land Cover Database. Modeled SEB response to a large seasonal variation of net radiation forcing was tested during synoptically quiescent periods of high pressure in winter 2011 and premonsoon summer 2012. Results are presented from simulations employing five nested domains down to 333-m horizontal resolution. A comparative analysis of model cases testing parameterization of physical processe...
We hypothesize that plant ecosystems form self-organizing systems on the landscape which function... more We hypothesize that plant ecosystems form self-organizing systems on the landscape which function to control their immediate surroundings towards the end of improving the efficiency of community carbon assimilation. Self- organization is difficult to define, but the concept requires the presence of feedbacks. Flows of control and feedbacks may be studied using network theory. This research uses entropy-based statistics of
Hydrology and geoscience education at the undergraduate and graduate levels may benefit greatly f... more Hydrology and geoscience education at the undergraduate and graduate levels may benefit greatly from a structured approach to pedagogy that utilizes modeling, authentic data, and simulation exercises to engage students in practice-like activities. Extensive evidence in the educational literature suggests that students retain more of their instruction, and attain higher levels of mastery over content, when interactive and practice-like activities
ABSTRACT Background/Question/Methods: Over the last 13 years the CAP LTER Program has studied wat... more ABSTRACT Background/Question/Methods: Over the last 13 years the CAP LTER Program has studied water dynamics in the Phoenix Metropolitan area using interdisciplinary approaches that include ecological, hydrologic, climatological, social, and economic components of the system. We present a conceptual model of the urban socio-ecological system and an overview of ongoing research projects based on this approach. In this conceptualization, the function and structure of urban ecosystems are dominated by human actions (e.g., water use) and results of those actions (e.g., the built environment, landscaping choices), respectively. Both interact with climatic and human inputs of water to control the horizontal and vertical components of the urban water budget. In Phoenix, stormwater dynamics dominate horizontal water fluxes while evaporation, transpiration, and [largely deliberate] infiltration dominate vertical water fluxes. Results/Conclusions: As with all hot, arid cities, the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect is an important phenomenon in Phoenix. We are using empirical and modeling approaches to better understand how urban ecosystem structure (the built environment and landscaping) interacts with human decisions about irrigation (part of urban ecosystem function) and regional climate to regulate the UHI and perhaps to create localized Urban Cooling Islands through landscaping choices (transpiration) and water- use decisions (irrigation). We are parameterizing a well-documented ecohydrology model (TIN-based Real-time Integrated Basin Simulator, or tRIBS) for urban settings to better predict these linkages in a spatially articulate manner. Our results demonstrate its superior efficacy compared with more traditional models, such as the Stormwater Management Model and the HEC Hydrologic Modeling System. In conjunction with this modeling effort, we have installed micrometeorological towers in 12 suburban yards in the same neighborhood. We are coupling data from these towers with data on outside water use and landscaping choices, and with information on homeowner perceptions about water use and microclimate. Finally, CAP LTER coordinates a large stormwater monitoring project in several hierarchically nested watersheds in Scottsdale AZ. Results from this project will be detailed in two other ESA presentations by L. Turnbull and N. Grimm. Here, we present results from a detailed land use/land cover analysis of these urban watersheds and we link these spatial data to information on water use based on landscaping type or specific data on the actual use of irrigation water. Together, these research efforts form the major components of our CAP LTER water-related research, and demonstrate our integrated conceptual approach.
Data Integrative Approaches in Computation, Analysis, and Modeling, 2005
In recent years there has been an explosion in the availability of earth science data from satell... more In recent years there has been an explosion in the availability of earth science data from satellites, remote sensors and numerical computations. This avalanche of data brings unprecedented opportunities for the study of environmental processes, but has led to new difficulties in organizing and communicating data for study. In many earth science studies, a majority of time and investment is
The geoscience educational agenda in hydrology involves teaching the description, explanation, an... more The geoscience educational agenda in hydrology involves teaching the description, explanation, and prediction of the occurrence, distribution and movement of water in nature. Hydrology is conventionally taught on a chalkboard using the fundamental physical laws ...
Variability in the partitioning and routing of moisture and the related response of vegetation is... more Variability in the partitioning and routing of moisture and the related response of vegetation is a central question of ecohydrology. The recent ``rediscovery'' of the Horton index (the ratio of catchment vaporization and catchment wetting) has yielded a simple data-driven method to identify patterns in hydrologic partitioning at the catchment scale. Plotting values of the maximum normalized difference vegetation index
In 1933, Horton analyzed the inter-annual variability of growing-season water balance components ... more In 1933, Horton analyzed the inter-annual variability of growing-season water balance components of the West Branch of the Delaware River at Hancock, NY, and discovered that the ratio of catchment vaporization to catchment wetting (the Horton index) remains almost constant despite large variability in precipitation. Eighty-six years later, Horton's observation was confirmed using data from 431 MOPEX catchment in the US, but it was noted that the inter-annual variability of the Horton index depends strongly on the ...
Information-Theoretic approaches to the stochastic study of hydrology and other environmental sci... more Information-Theoretic approaches to the stochastic study of hydrology and other environmental sciences have become popular in recent years, owing to a greater availability of environmental data and the need to develop tools that can dissect the complex dynamics of environmental systems. Entropy-based metrics such at Transfer Entropy can go beyond correlation and uncover the cardinality of relationships between measured signals, and are therefore useful for the study of feedback-based complex environmental systems that are ...
Plant ecosystems are emergent self-organizing systems, which evolve to exploit the variable gradi... more Plant ecosystems are emergent self-organizing systems, which evolve to exploit the variable gradients of carbon, water, and energy at the land surface. Emergence due to self-organization is difficult to define and observe, but the concept requires the presence of feedbacks. Feedback and control in a coupled, self-organized system may be studied using network theory. This research uses entropy-based statistics of information flow to render the eco-hydrological system as a process network of weighted couplings between the ...
ABSTRACT This study evaluates the water intensity of thermoelectric power plants in the eleven We... more ABSTRACT This study evaluates the water intensity of thermoelectric power plants in the eleven Western states included within the Western Electricity Coordinating Council region. Water intensities are combined with retail electricity sales using an embedded resource accounting framework to estimate a value intensity of water embedded in electrical energy production and trade in the Western U.S. States with lower water intensities and higher retail electricity prices tend to be net importers of electricity and have the highest value intensities. A 35% increase in the value intensity of water embedded in electricity traded in export was shown to have occurred relative to electricity produced for in-state use. This increase in the value intensity of embedded water suggests that embedded water in the electricity trade has already emerged as a substitute for direct trade in water resources, and that this trade is organized in a manner that appears to benefit both importing and exporting parties.
The objective of this project is to develop and test a prototype community cyberinfrastructure (C... more The objective of this project is to develop and test a prototype community cyberinfrastructure (CI) for research, education and outreach in hydrology. The proposed CI, called WaterHUB, is based on the well established HUBZero infrastructure at Purdue University with capabilities for community building sharing data and modeling tools in an interactive environment. Initial development of WaterHUB is guided by research questions related to hydrologic data management, quantifying hydrologic fluxes, flow paths and storages in watersheds. Simple analysis tools are being developed to ingest public domain geospatial and temporal data, including observations data provided by the CUAHSI HIS web services. Similarly, a community environment for sharing and evaluating hydrology curriculum is being developed. The educational component of the project involves a platform for curriculum module development, sharing of software tools, input/output datasets and multimedia resources. The module developm...
Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 2015
Physical mechanisms of incongruency between observations and Weather Research and Forecasting (WR... more Physical mechanisms of incongruency between observations and Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model predictions are examined. Limitations of evaluation are constrained by (i) parameterizations of model physics, (ii) parameterizations of input data, (iii) model resolution, and (iv) flux observation resolution. Observations from a new 22.1-m flux tower situated within a residential neighborhood in Phoenix, Arizona, are utilized to evaluate the ability of the urbanized WRF to resolve finescale surface energy balance (SEB) when using the urban classes derived from the 30-m-resolution National Land Cover Database. Modeled SEB response to a large seasonal variation of net radiation forcing was tested during synoptically quiescent periods of high pressure in winter 2011 and premonsoon summer 2012. Results are presented from simulations employing five nested domains down to 333-m horizontal resolution. A comparative analysis of model cases testing parameterization of physical processe...
We hypothesize that plant ecosystems form self-organizing systems on the landscape which function... more We hypothesize that plant ecosystems form self-organizing systems on the landscape which function to control their immediate surroundings towards the end of improving the efficiency of community carbon assimilation. Self- organization is difficult to define, but the concept requires the presence of feedbacks. Flows of control and feedbacks may be studied using network theory. This research uses entropy-based statistics of
Hydrology and geoscience education at the undergraduate and graduate levels may benefit greatly f... more Hydrology and geoscience education at the undergraduate and graduate levels may benefit greatly from a structured approach to pedagogy that utilizes modeling, authentic data, and simulation exercises to engage students in practice-like activities. Extensive evidence in the educational literature suggests that students retain more of their instruction, and attain higher levels of mastery over content, when interactive and practice-like activities
ABSTRACT Background/Question/Methods: Over the last 13 years the CAP LTER Program has studied wat... more ABSTRACT Background/Question/Methods: Over the last 13 years the CAP LTER Program has studied water dynamics in the Phoenix Metropolitan area using interdisciplinary approaches that include ecological, hydrologic, climatological, social, and economic components of the system. We present a conceptual model of the urban socio-ecological system and an overview of ongoing research projects based on this approach. In this conceptualization, the function and structure of urban ecosystems are dominated by human actions (e.g., water use) and results of those actions (e.g., the built environment, landscaping choices), respectively. Both interact with climatic and human inputs of water to control the horizontal and vertical components of the urban water budget. In Phoenix, stormwater dynamics dominate horizontal water fluxes while evaporation, transpiration, and [largely deliberate] infiltration dominate vertical water fluxes. Results/Conclusions: As with all hot, arid cities, the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect is an important phenomenon in Phoenix. We are using empirical and modeling approaches to better understand how urban ecosystem structure (the built environment and landscaping) interacts with human decisions about irrigation (part of urban ecosystem function) and regional climate to regulate the UHI and perhaps to create localized Urban Cooling Islands through landscaping choices (transpiration) and water- use decisions (irrigation). We are parameterizing a well-documented ecohydrology model (TIN-based Real-time Integrated Basin Simulator, or tRIBS) for urban settings to better predict these linkages in a spatially articulate manner. Our results demonstrate its superior efficacy compared with more traditional models, such as the Stormwater Management Model and the HEC Hydrologic Modeling System. In conjunction with this modeling effort, we have installed micrometeorological towers in 12 suburban yards in the same neighborhood. We are coupling data from these towers with data on outside water use and landscaping choices, and with information on homeowner perceptions about water use and microclimate. Finally, CAP LTER coordinates a large stormwater monitoring project in several hierarchically nested watersheds in Scottsdale AZ. Results from this project will be detailed in two other ESA presentations by L. Turnbull and N. Grimm. Here, we present results from a detailed land use/land cover analysis of these urban watersheds and we link these spatial data to information on water use based on landscaping type or specific data on the actual use of irrigation water. Together, these research efforts form the major components of our CAP LTER water-related research, and demonstrate our integrated conceptual approach.
Data Integrative Approaches in Computation, Analysis, and Modeling, 2005
In recent years there has been an explosion in the availability of earth science data from satell... more In recent years there has been an explosion in the availability of earth science data from satellites, remote sensors and numerical computations. This avalanche of data brings unprecedented opportunities for the study of environmental processes, but has led to new difficulties in organizing and communicating data for study. In many earth science studies, a majority of time and investment is
The geoscience educational agenda in hydrology involves teaching the description, explanation, an... more The geoscience educational agenda in hydrology involves teaching the description, explanation, and prediction of the occurrence, distribution and movement of water in nature. Hydrology is conventionally taught on a chalkboard using the fundamental physical laws ...
Variability in the partitioning and routing of moisture and the related response of vegetation is... more Variability in the partitioning and routing of moisture and the related response of vegetation is a central question of ecohydrology. The recent ``rediscovery'' of the Horton index (the ratio of catchment vaporization and catchment wetting) has yielded a simple data-driven method to identify patterns in hydrologic partitioning at the catchment scale. Plotting values of the maximum normalized difference vegetation index
In 1933, Horton analyzed the inter-annual variability of growing-season water balance components ... more In 1933, Horton analyzed the inter-annual variability of growing-season water balance components of the West Branch of the Delaware River at Hancock, NY, and discovered that the ratio of catchment vaporization to catchment wetting (the Horton index) remains almost constant despite large variability in precipitation. Eighty-six years later, Horton's observation was confirmed using data from 431 MOPEX catchment in the US, but it was noted that the inter-annual variability of the Horton index depends strongly on the ...
Information-Theoretic approaches to the stochastic study of hydrology and other environmental sci... more Information-Theoretic approaches to the stochastic study of hydrology and other environmental sciences have become popular in recent years, owing to a greater availability of environmental data and the need to develop tools that can dissect the complex dynamics of environmental systems. Entropy-based metrics such at Transfer Entropy can go beyond correlation and uncover the cardinality of relationships between measured signals, and are therefore useful for the study of feedback-based complex environmental systems that are ...
Plant ecosystems are emergent self-organizing systems, which evolve to exploit the variable gradi... more Plant ecosystems are emergent self-organizing systems, which evolve to exploit the variable gradients of carbon, water, and energy at the land surface. Emergence due to self-organization is difficult to define and observe, but the concept requires the presence of feedbacks. Feedback and control in a coupled, self-organized system may be studied using network theory. This research uses entropy-based statistics of information flow to render the eco-hydrological system as a process network of weighted couplings between the ...
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