MMS and RiverWare are linked using a common hydrologic
database (HDB). The database used varies among the basins,
with Oracle and HEC-DSS being currently supported. Real-time
hydrologic and meteorological data are provided to HDB every
six hours. HDB is also the database of record and so all model
results and forecasts are stored there as well.
A typical exchange between RiverWare and MMS would be
for RiverWare to request all inflow predictions for reservoirs in a
basin. A watershed model in MMS would simulate these forecast
streamflows and write them to HDB. RiverWare would read these
results and evaluate alternative reservoir-management strategies.
The associated reservoir releases for each strategy would be written
to HDB. These strategies may have implications for environmental
or flood issues. MMS could be called again to run one or
more hydraulic and/or ecosystem models to evaluate the effects
of the reservoir releases on selected river reaches. These results
would then be written to HDB for use by RiverWare in selecting
a specific management alternative.
The modelling capabilities of MMS and RiverWare include
simulating watershed runoff, reservoir inflows, and the impacts
of resource-management decisions on municipal, agricultural,
and industrial water users, environmental concerns, power generation,
and recreational interests. The WARSMP DSS is currently
operational in the Gunnison River Basin, Colorado;Yakima
River Basin,Washington; Rio Grande Basin in Colorado and New
Mexico, and Truckee River Basin in California and Nevada.
The Upper Gunnison River Basin provides a typical example
of the modelling issues that need to be considered in applying
MMS. The basin is about 10 000 km2 in size. The GISWeasel was
used to partition it into subunits or MRUs, using characteristics
such as slope, aspect, elevation, vegetation type, soil type, and
precipitation distribution (Fig. 7.7, Plate 13). Each unit is assumed
to be homogeneous with respect to its hydrologic response and to
the characteristics listed. Each unit is termed a hydrologic response
unit (HRU), which is just a specific type of MRU. More than
1000 HRUs were defined. The HRUs were then grouped into 15
major subbasins and 15 streamflow forecast nodes were defined.
However, only 5 of the 15 subbasins had observed streamflow
data. The subbasin configuration, HRU delineations, and other
data layers were specified to the OUI through the tree.xml file
for use in organizing the display and analysis of data and model
results.