Jerad Bales

1
CUAHSI and the USGS in the Neuse River Basin, NC

• Jerad Bales
• U.S. Geological Survey
• April, 28, 2003

2
Overview

• Terrain information
• 133 cities program
• LIDAR
• NHD
• Water cycling in
• the Neuse Basin
• Precipitation
• Streamflow
• Ground water

3
AgricultureNCs largest industry

• Accounts for 25 of States income
• Provides 22 of jobs
• 57,000 farms
• One-third of States land used for farming
• Livestock accounted for 58 of farm receipts in
  1999
• NC ranks 1st or 2nd in production of
• Tobacco
• Sweet potatoes
• Hogs
• Turkeys
• Christmas trees
• Trout

4
Tourism

• Tourism is States 2nd largest industry
• 43 million visits 12 billion in revenue.
• 1.2 million acres of National Forests
• Blue Ridge Parkway most visited park.
• 10 National Wildlife Refuges.
• Dynamic barrier islands.

5
Increasing Population

• 11th most populous state (8.05 million).
• 21 growth in 1990s.
• Developed land grew from 7.7 to 10.5 between
  1982 and 1999 (1 530 sq mi).
• 7th fastest growing state in 1990s.
• Disproportionate growth rates
• Piedmont urban crescent
• Selected coastal counties
• Southwest mountain counties

6
USGS 133 Urban Area Project
7
Example Deliverables Mecklenburg County, NC

• True Color, 1 Foot Pixel Resolution,
  Ortho-Rectified Digital Imagery
• LIDAR Data Raw, Bare Earth Mass Points, and
  Reflective Surface
• Metadata
• All Products in Public Domain

8
Reflective Surface Hill Shade
9
Reflective Surface Elevations Draped 2001
Ortho-Imagery
10
133 Urban Area PrototypeMecklenburg County
Orthos
11
NC Floodplain Mapping Program

• 60 million multi-agency effort.
• LIDAR elev. and DEMs for entire state.
• Use DEMs to perform hydraulic studies.
• HEC-RAS models mapped on DOQs.
• USGS regression equations for peaks.
• Digital maps served on the web.
• Real-time flood inundation mapping.

US 17, Brunswick Co, NC.
12
LIDARNC Specifications

• 125 control points per county.
• 20 cm RMSE in coastal area ?2 ft contour.
• 25 cm RMSE elsewhere ? 4 ft contour.
• Example QA results (Moore County)
• 100 of points 13.2 cm
• 95 of points 11.7
• Grass 14.3
• Crop 8.3
• Scrub 16
• Forest 11.2
• Developed 4.5

13
Neuse River Floodplain From LIDAR-Derived DEM
14
50 ft
20 ft
5 ft
15
Automated basin delineation
NED
LIDAR
16
Comparison of Derived Basin Characteristics
17
National Hydrography Dataset

• A nationally consistent hydrography dataset that
  provides
• A stream address a unique identifier (reach
  code) for each part of the surface water network.
• Up and downstream navigation tabular routing to
  allow up or downstream navigation on all
  connecting streams from any point on the network.
• Indexing tie outside data sources (points,
  lines, polygons) to streams by giving them a
  stream address.

18
Stream density in the Upper Neuse Basin
124K
1100K
19
Precipitation (in Charlotte)

• 72 tipping-bucket raingages with 1-minute
  reporting.
• 64 gages in 540 mi2 Mecklenburg Co.

20
(No Transcript)
21
(No Transcript)
22
Is Weather Changing?
23
Precipitation Trends 1949 - 98
Summer
Annual
24
Maximum Temperature 1949 - 98
Summer
Annual
25
USGS ASC Capabilities
26
Inundation layers provided by USGS National
Mapping. Derived from multiple sensing sources.
27
Fine-scale, unsteady, two-dimensional flood flow
calculations
28
Real-Time Flood Inundation Mappingin the Tar and
Neuse River Basins

• Develop water-surface profiles at 0.5 ft
  increments of river stage above bankfull.

29
Map water-surface elevations to DEM
30
Link real-time streamflow information to
inundation map library
31
Neuse Basin Streamgage Network
32
Hurricane Floyd September 1999
33
(No Transcript)
34
1998 2002 Drought
35
(No Transcript)
36
Streamflow in Upper Neuse
37
Eastern NC Water Budget
Eastern NC Water Budget
38
Coastal Plain Ground-Water System
39
Coastal Plain Ground-Water System
40
Ground Water in Black Creek Aquifer, 1989 - 98
41
Ground-Water Discharge and Streamflow
Fort Barnwell
Contentnea C.
Bear Creek
Streamflow, in cubic feet per second
Little River
Clayton
Kinston
Goldsboro
City of Raleigh Outfall
Falls Dam
River miles from mouth of Neuse River
42
Ground-Water in Brunswick Co., NC
43
Public Needs and Science Issues
The research work of the Geological Survey has
not been confined to investigations whose
immediate economic value is self-evident.
Realizing that the pure science of today becomes
the applied science of tomorrow, it has neglected
no phase of the study of the earth. (George
Smith, 3rd Director, USGS).
The USGS exists to serve the practical needs of
the Nation, but in order to do so, the USGS must
also advance basic scientific understanding.
Federal research should be organized around a
problem or need, and not around a discipline.
(Charles Walcott, 4th Director, USGS)
USGS scientists must define and explain sciences
societal payoffs if they are to continue to be
funded. Fortunately, the agency has a long
history of close links between research and
social issues (NRC, 2001).
44
USGS River Science Goal 1 Expand and Enhance
River Monitoring Systems
Long-term databases are one of the USGSs most
important contributions to the nation, and care
must be taken not to disrupt them. (NRC, 2001).
The decay of monitoring networks over the last
30 years due to political and fiscal
instabilities has been substantial. (Entekhabi
and others, 1999).
45
USGS River Science Goal 2 Understand Regional
and Global Water Cycles
The cycling of water among the three phases is
overwhelmingly important for Earth, driving not
just the atmospheric general circulation, but
the very existence of life as we know it.
Hornberger and others, 2001).
Immediately related to the hydrological cycle .
. . are the cycle of erosion and sedimentation
and the major biogeochemical cycles. (Dooge,
1988)
46
USGS River Science Goal 3 Describe Relation of
Natural Variability and Human Activities to
Riverine Ecosystem Health
Long-term changes in the water cycle will also
be strongly coupled to changes in biogeochemical
processes in terrestrial and freshwater
ecosystems. (Hornberger and others, 2001)
Over the past several years, there has been a
mounting stream of evidence that humans, in the
aggregate, are overloading many of the planets
great biogeochemical systems. (McMichael,
2001).
Large-river ecology has been subject to a
proliferation of conceptual constructs without a
corresponding match between observational
confirmation and refutation. (Galat and
Zweimuller, 2001)
47
USGS River Science Goal 4 Predict Effects of
Natural Changes and Human Actions on Rivers
A major purpose of scientific investigations is
to describe reality through models. (Gauch,
1993).
The USGS should advance the science of whole
watershed restoration by . . . translating
knowledge gained from data collection and
experimental studies into models that can be used
to evaluate restoration actions. (NRC, 1997).
Quantitative results that models provide are
highly uncertain because of parameter uncertainty
and possibly inaccuracy in modeling concepts.
Model capabilities are often overstated or
uncritiqued. (Beven, 1993).
48
CUAHSI Program Driver 1

• Local vs. remote forcing of water cycling.
• Important temporal scales. Fast (e.g. soil
  moisture) vs. slow (e.g. ground water) cycling.
• Important spatial scales ? Sprawl, the
  ground-water system, and water cycling.
• What are the scales at which humans affect water
  cycling?
• Local precipitation distribution.
• Integration of remotely-sensed data with
  ground-based instrumentation.
• What is the importance of the lateral
  distribution of soil moisture on cycling?

49
(No Transcript)
50
(No Transcript)