Chautauqua: the Alberta groundwater

information system using FEWS and iMOD

Wiebe Borren

Dan Palombi, Brian Smerdon (Alberta Geological Survey, Canada), Kevin Parks (Alberta

Energy Regulator), Edwin Welles (Deltares USA Inc.), Sheila Ball, Peter Vermeulen, Hans

van Duijne (Deltares)

01-Nov-2016

Alberta, Canada

Alberta Groundwater Information System

AER-AGS:

• Alberta Energy Regulator

• Alberta Geological Survey

Regulation process:

• Licensing groundwater abstractions

• Evaluating (cumulative) effects of abstractions

→ Need for a consistent and tranparent regulation process based on

spatial temporal groundwater information

→ Need for an operational management/information system

Operational water management system

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Linking Good Science to ....

• Water Supply Managers

• Planning Agencies

• Regulators

• Industry Operators

• Policymakers

• Public

The link between Information

Builders and Information Users

0

5

10

15

20

01-01-03 19-02-03 09-04-03 28-05-03 16-07-03 03-09-03 22-10-03 10-12-03datum

afvoe

r [m

3 /s]

Gaarkeuken_meting

Gaarkeuken_v2.0_final

Gaarkeuken_v1.1.2.

FEWS

FEWS = Forecasting, Evaluation and Warning System

(previously: Flood Early Warning System)

• Operational information system

• Integrator of data and models

• Scenario analysis

• Structured work processes

• Pre-defined modeling processes and displays

• Highly configurable: tailor made to the needs of the users

Chautauqua

Education movement in North

America during the late 19th

and early 20th century. The

chautauqua message of

“progress and democracy”

relates perfectly to the

objectives of the Alberta

groundwater information

system: innovation,

transparency and openness

to a broad audience.

Chautauqua

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Work Process Data Viewer

Map display XY Plots (graphs) Yield Matrix Spatial Display

Work Process

iMOD scenarios

1. What-if scenario with new abstraction:

• Application from industry for groundwater abstraction(s)

• Scenario editor for specifying new abstractions

→ automatically converted to iMOD WEL package

2. Reserves forecast:

• Future scenario of oil reserves exploitation = scenario of new

groundwater abstractions

• Shape file is provided by reserves forecast group of AER

→ automatically converted to iMOD WEL package

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Data viewer

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Data viewer

Observed (blue line)

Regime curves (filled colors)

Spatial display: heads

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Spatial display: infiltration/seepage flux

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Spatial display: cumulative effect on head

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Spatial display: base flow

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compare a

month to

long-term

monthly

regime

(calculated

automatically

by iMOD)

Spatial display: base flow

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compare a

month to

long-term

monthly

regime

(calculated

automatically

by iMOD)

iMOD toolbar buttons

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iMOD in 2-D view

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iMOD in 3-D view

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Advantages of iMOD in Chautauqua system

iMOD can be easily run from FEWS:

• IDF files can be imported and exported by FEWS

• Adapters between FEWS and iMOD are simple

Scenarios:

• Defining scenario templates by (small) differences in iMOD runfiles

• iMOD run file makes it easy to run user-defined scenarios

• Sub-modeling and scaling capabilities of iMOD can be exploited

iMOD displays:

• 2-D and 3-D viewer started from toolbar buttons in FEWS