A Collaborative, In Situ, Mountain Hydrology NASA Test Bed
Beginning as snowmelt from Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, the Colorado River—often called the Lifeline of the West—supplies water to over 40 million people in seven US states and Mexico. As demand for that water grows and climate-driven drought threatens supply, there is an urgent need to improve scientific understanding of mountain hydrology and advance decision-relevant hydrologic research in the Colorado River Headwaters region, which serves as an example for similarly positioned mountain headwaters around the world.
Fortunately, much research is already underway, focused on different, yet interrelated challenges, and spurred by considerable advances in monitoring technologies, hydrologic modeling, and data science. Launched in September 2021 and funded by NASA, this project has sought to further scientific understanding that can help us better manage this vital water and ecological resource. By engaging existing research communities in the Colorado River’s mountain headwaters and leaning into expertise in collaborative science and social network analysis, the team worked to identify innovations that can promote and accelerate our collective understanding of this critical water supply.
Project Goals:
- Accelerate understanding of mountain water cycles and improve forecasts in a rapidly changing world.
- Use long-term monitoring to calibrate, validate, complement, and enhance satellite data and land surface models.
- Cultivate learning and community building among scientists, within and across institutions, and in collaboration with research users.
The project has been highly participatory, including outreach to strategic partners, a series of community meetings, a listening tour, and surveys for the Earth science community. The team engaged many disciplines to explore pathways to connect in situ monitoring of hydrology and ecology; land surface, hydrologic, and snow modeling; data science; and community science. These engagements, a network analysis, and a user needs assessment investigation all informed recommendations and the design of a test bed which supports collaborative research. A report, completed in May 2024, highlights both the efforts underway and the untapped potential that exists to improve mountain hydrology research and its relevance to practice.
For additional details, contact Tanya Petach, tpetach@agci.org.
Project Team
Funder
This effort has been made possible through funding by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Terrestrial Hydrology Program, award number 80NSSC21K0984.