August 1, 2011.
A 170,000 wetland complex, including wetlands managed by the Grassland Water District (GWD), are located in California’s Central Valley in Merced County. The GWD is divided into North and South areas which are further divided into subareas. Historically, these wetlands were created by annual floods along the San Joaquin River that inundated the floodplain and created habitat for native wildlife, and over-wintering waterfowl. Today, these wetland areas are managed artificially with water supply provided from the Delta. Data from a real-time sensor network located along channels and at the inlets and outlets to and from individual ponds is being used to measure and inform decision makers responsible for wetland salinity management. A decision support tool based on the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) model is being developed to aid wetland salinity decision making. This model will use data developed by the real-time flow and salinity monitoring network. Satellite imagery is being used to estimate seepage and evapo-transpiration in this model by estimating the expanding wetland footprint during flood-up (September through November) and the contracting wetland footprint during drawdown (February through April). Landsat multispectral images were examined to develop estimates of this wetland footprint over the flooded wetland season. These data are utilized in a decision support tool developed using the WEAP model simulator. This decision support tool provides the information needed for the wetland water managers to improve their management of salinity and meet State water quality objectives for salinity.
Nigel W. T. Quinn
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL)
This material is based upon work supported by the S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation and by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0952013. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation or the National Science Foundation.