Events

Challenge and prize competitions are one path that federal agencies are taking to drive innovation and solve mission-centric problems. More than 425 challenges have been run in the Federal government since 2010.  The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation is participating, in collaboration with other WestFAST agencies, in several water-resource challenge and prize competitions including solutions in […]

Dr. Bradley Doorn and Forrest Melton from the NASA Applied Sciences program provided an overview of NASA satellite and airborne missions relevant to water resources monitoring and management in the western US. They also presented highlights from NASA’s portfolio of applied science activities that are focused on applying NASA’s remote sensing capabilities to support advances […]

WestFAST members and webinar participants reviewed selected USGS Water Resources Programs with focus on the National Water Census .  Pixie Hamiliton, USGS Cooperative Water Program National Coordinator  and Sonja Jones, USGS Water Census Programs, led the discussion which included an overview of the USGS Water Availability and Science Program. Click here to find webinar presentation materials.

Mike Eberle, USDA Forest Service Surface Water Program leader, reviewed priority water resource issues and program in the Forest Service and Daniel Isaak, USFS Research Fish Biologist presented on the activities and products of the USFS NorWest stream-temperature database and modeling program. The NorWest Program provides stream temperature data and geospatial map outputs from a regional temperature model for the Northwest U.S. […]

The interagency National Drought Resilience Partnership (NDRP) was established in 2013 as part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to help communities better prepare for future droughts and reduce the impact of drought events on livelihoods and the economy. WestFAST was briefed on the progress and products of the NDRP including the activities of the […]

Andrew Hautzinger (WestFAST) and Mike Higgins of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will brief WestFAST on agency structure and priority water-resource related issues including (1) Fisheries and Aquatic Conservation, (2) Ecological Services/Endangered Species,  (3) Wildlife & Sport Fish Restoration Program, and (4) the National Wildlife Refuge System. Click here to view presentation slides.

On April 7th, at 2:00 (eastern), WestFAST will be briefed on progress in the development of the WSWC Water Date Exchange (WaDE). WaDE is a framework developed to allow various groups better ability to share state water data including information on water allocation, supply, and water demand data. WaDE is a cooperative effort between the […]

USGS Research Hydrologist Matthew Miller provided a briefing on a recent study describing how scientists used a new method to more accurately estimate the percentage of groundwater in streamflow, finding that more than half of the streamflow in the Upper Colorado River Basin originates as groundwater. A model has been developed to assess the spatial […]

The Western States Water Council (WSWC) believes that the current accuracy of forecasts (generally referred to as forecast skill) for the sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) time frame is not adequate to support water management decision-making. S2S forecasts include environmental predictions with forecast ranges from 2 weeks to 12 months. The WSWC has asked that the […]