Climate Variations, Climate Change and Water Resources Engineering  

     (transfers to the Task Committee Web Page)

Proposed Committee Council Name:

Climate Variations, Climate Change and Water Resources Engineering

Parent Committee/Council: Surface Water Hydrology Technical Committee

Type of Committee: Task Committee

Committee Purpose: (for publication in ASCE Official Register)

To advance the understanding of and disseminate information on climate variations and climate change and their significance for water resources engineering; to provide a forum for civil engineers and non-engineer scientists to interact on emerging climate issues relevant to water resources; and, to promote interdisciplinary approaches to address and solve water resources problems associated with climate variation and change.

Committee Objectives:

1) Sponsor specialty sessions at annual ASCE Water Resources Engineering conferences that address and link climate and water resources issues;

2) To invite and attract new non-engineer to join EWRI by providing an interdisciplinary forum to interact with the engineering community;

3) Produce a summary report on the current knowledge of climate variations and climate change and their significance for water resources engineering;

4) Promote publications on the subject in ASCE journals.

Committee Officers (All must be EWRI Members)

Chair Name: Jurgen Garbrecht Telephone: (405) 262-5291

Address: USDA, ARS Fax: (405) 262-0133

Grazinglands Research Laboratory e-mail: garbrech@grl.ars.usda.gov

7207 West Cheyenne Str. EWRI ID#: 215130

El Reno, OK 73036

Vice Chair Name: Lall Upmanu Telephone: (435) 797-3184

Address: Utah State University Fax: (435) 797-3663

Utah Water Research Laboratory e-mail: ulall@cc.usu.edu

Room 103 EWRI ID#: 200000

8200 Old Main Hill

Logan, Utah 84322-8200

Secretary Name: Michael Anderson Telephone: (530) 752-6670

Address: Department of Civil Engineering Fax: (530) 752-3439

Everson Hall e-mail: mlanderson@ucdavis.edu

University of California EWRI ID#: 258063

Davis, CA 95616

List of other committee members:

Dr. Greg Johnson

USDA, NRCS

National Water and Climate Center

101 SW Main Str., Suite 1600

Portland, OR 97204-3224

Tel.: (503) 414-3017

FAX: (503) 414-3101

e-mail: gjohnson@wcc.nrcs.usda.gov

Others to be selected.

Justify how this committee fulfills the mission and focus of the EWRI Division:

- This Task Committee advances the knowledge and improves the understanding of climate issues in water resources engineering.

- This Task Committee provides interactions and collaboration between water resources engineers and the new non-engineer scientist members in the recently created EWRI. Scientists may include hydrologists, climatologists, meteorologists, paleologists, ecologists and others dealing with climate and water issues.

- This Task Committee provides the forum to develop interdisciplinary and innovative solutions to water resources problems which are driven by climate.

Does this committee functionally overlap with other EWRI committees? No

Show milestone dates for completion of planned committee activities:

- Initial meeting of control members at Minneapolis 2000 and personal solicitation for potential TC members.

- Advertising for TC activities and TC members in journals after approval of TC by ASCE.

- Draft of structure and content of report by and at May 2001 conference.

- Solicitation of session papers and contributions to report starting in May 2001.

- Sponsor specialty sessions on Climate Variability and Change at ASCE Annual Water Resources Conferences starting in 2002 (too late for May 2001conference)

- Initial draft report at the ASCE Water Resources conference 2003

- Final summary report at ASCE Water resources conference 2004.

Show funding requirements for planned committee activities:

$5000.00 for travel of control members and advertising in non-ASCE outlets to attract non-engineer members.

Person preparing this proposal:

Name: Jurgen Garbrecht

Date: 27 July 2000

OVERVIEW

Climate Variations, Climate Change and Water Resources Engineering

Climate change, decade-long climate variations, and even inter-annual climate variations can have far reaching economic and societal impacts. A prime example is the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. A seven year drought, associated with extensive conversion of grassland to wheatland and systematic overgrazing, led to destructive dust storms that wrecked the agricultural economy of the Great Plains, resulting in mass migration of thousands of bankrupt farm families. Other examples of drought impacts, though smaller in scale, include the 1976-1977 and 1987-1992 droughts in California that slowly depleted state water reserves and ultimately affected irrigated agriculture, urban water supply, reservoir operations and aquatic recreation. An oversupply of water can be damaging as well. The 1980's rise in the Great Salt Lake, the 1990's rise of Devils Lake in North Dakota, and the 1993 upper Mississippi River basin flood that have all been related to large scale climatic events, caused significant flood damage to society and have resulted in challenging engineering problems. Even though we would like to think that today's technology driven economy is better insulated from climate catastrophes, variations in climate still impact many areas of our society that depend on weather, climate or water resources. These areas include agriculture, urban and industrial water supply, hydro-electric power generation, transportation, and recreation. Regions with growing population exert increasing demands on water resources, and are threatened by even moderate droughts. The broad and far reaching economic and societal impacts of climate variations requires that they be recognized early. With early identification, adaptive mitigating strategies may be developed, opportunities be exploited, and policies and investments be made to ensure a secure water supply and economy.

The purpose of this Task Committee is to advance the understanding of and disseminate information on climate variations and climate change and their significance for water resources engineering. This includes assessing the predictability of the statistics of water supply and demand, of floods, and of water quality as a result of climate variations and change. The specialty conference sessions sponsored by this Task Committee will provide a forum for engineers and scientists to interact on emerging climate issues relevant to water resources. Finally, the activities of the Task Committee in general will promote interdisciplinary approaches to address and solve water resources problems associated with climate variations and change.

The main beneficiaries of the specialty conference sessions are water resources planners and managers; flood and drought preparedness agencies; reservoir operators; users of long-range seasonal climate forecasts; agricultural producers; and, others that rely on water resources budgeting, planning and systems operations.