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Beyond the Historical Record: How I Simulated Seattle’s Future Climate

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This case study demonstrates the end-to-end application of PrecipGen for stochastic empirical weather simulation. We examine the workflow for generating synthetic daily precipitation data for Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, covering automated data acquisition, statistical parameter estimation, trend analysis, and model validation against historical records. Raw weather data is often incomplete or inconsistent. For this project, rather than manually retrieving data, we established an automated pipeline to identify, download, and validate the necessary records. Using PrecipGen , we automated the station search. We targeted Sea-Tac Airport and filtered for stations within a 25km radius containing at least 15 years of historical data. Code Example: Automated Station Discovery import precipgen as pg # Sea-Tac coordinates LAT = 47.4502 LON = -122.3088 # Find nearby stations with sufficient data stations = pg.find_nearby_stations( latitude=LAT, longitude=LON, ...
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International IWRM Conference in Germany

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If you get a chance, you should attend this conference. It looks like a good one! http://www.iwrm-karlsruhe.com/en/home/homepage.jsp It will be held on 21-22 November in Karlsruhe, Germany. Main Topic: Interactions of Water with Energy and Materials in Urban Areas and Agriculture   Sub-Topics: Challenges for Future Cities and Efficient Agricultural Production Security and Efficiency of Water Infrastructures Energy Efficiency in Water Usage Heavy Rain and Flood Management Management of Waste Water Water Related Environmental Protection in Urban Planning Competing Water Uses Optimal and Sustainable Use of Water Climate Change and Effects on Water Resources Regulatory and Policy Framework Demand Side Water Management Water Efficiency Frameworks Public and Private Water Policies  
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Empirical vs. Conceptual Model

Often times, we need to choose between the conceptual modeling framework and the empirical. We should consider the definition of each: The empirical model   The empirical model attempts to establish a causal linkage between “X” and “Y” without detailed consideration of the internal processes. The equations and parameters of such model have limited physical significance. Instead, they are selected through optimization of some goodness-of-fit criterion. The conceptual model   The conceptual model represents, to the extent possible, all physical mechanisms that govern the process within the system.
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Water-Marginal Cost Curve

In a very interesting report I recently read, the idea of a Water-Marginal Cost Curve was brought to light (Barilla Group, 2009). This approach is claimed to provide decision makers with a microeconomic analysis of the cost and potential of a range of existing technical measures to close the projected gap between water demand and supply. References: Barilla Group, et al. "Chartering Our Water Future, Economic frameworks to inform decision-making" . 2009.
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Modeling Water Rights

Introduction Water law often drives the decisions made in operations and planning of water systems. Water law is the foundation for administering and managing water supplies. Because of the importance of water law in water planning and operations modeling, water rights modeling capability in your model should adequately represent the legal systems currently in place. This post summarizes the basic legal systems used to manage and facilitate allocation of limited water supplies. The summaries of legal systems presented in this post are founded on my understanding of U.S. Water Law and a cursory review and comparison of systems used in Canada and Australia. Following a short description of each basic legal system, a summary of modeling requirements for the system is explored. Legal Systems for Water Allocation For the purposes of this post, I refer to a water user as an “account.” All accounts have a demand for water and a water right that justifies use of their water. W...
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Optimization in Integrated Water Resources Management

Introduction Optimization is a very large topic, even within the confines of water resources planning and management. For today, I would like to focus on a single application, which I found while reading the Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA). I highly recommend JAWRA as a great source on all things water resources and for updates on the latest issues. In the February 2011 issue (yes, I'm a little behind on my reading), there is an article called "Optimal Pollution Trading without Pollution Reductions: A Note". I would like to take the time to write up a review of this article. Pollutant Trading Application Pollutant trading is in it's infancy - the experimental stages. Current challenges include high transaction costs, difficulties in transferring liabilities, and pollution allowances in existing programs. This article describes how two different types of polluters (farm and factory) can collaborate in order to reduce the impact on rece...
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Modular Systems Modeling

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It is necessary to study not only parts and processes in isolation, but also to solve the decisive problems found in the organization and order unifying them, resulting from dynamic interaction of parts, and making the behavior of parts different when studied in isolation or within the whole. Systems Modular systems modeling is an approach to modeling that can be very useful for applications in integrated water resources management because of its inherent structure and organization. Every system is designed to achieve some objective. A system is made up of a network of interrelated components, which may consist of data, data processors, reporting elements, and subsystems. The term "Systems Modeling" was introduced in the early 1960's and became famous shortly after the birth of FORTRAN. Since that time, it grew steadily in popularity until finally plateauing in the year 2000. The term "Systems Approach" peaked in 1975 and has since been on a steady decline...
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