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<br />Chapter I <br /> <br />Introduction <br /> <br />4. Study the potential ramifications of changing climates on irrigation, water-related <br />recreation, endangered fish, municipal and industrial use of water, and hydropower <br />generation in the Gunnison River Basin. <br /> <br />5. Develop management strategies for mitigation and adaptation to changing supplies of <br />and demands for water <br /> <br />6. Develop generic water resource models, databases, and integrated computer systems to <br />be used for global climate change analysis and as water resource decision suppon tools. <br /> <br />Reclamation's Upper Colorado Regional Office in Salt Lake City, Utah, was tasked with <br />addressing the first, second, and last of these objectives. This document describes the research that <br />was conducted in addressing these three objectives. <br /> <br />Work began with the development of a physically based distributed parameter rainfall runoff <br />model for the Upper Gunnison River Basin. The application of this model for global climate <br />change assessment and its use as a "real time" operations model are discussed. During the course <br />of the study, a ponion of the Gunnison Climate Study funds was devoted to the development of <br />several computerized water resource management systems. These systems include the Modular <br />Modeling System (MMS), the Upper Colorado Hydrologic Database (HDB), and the Hydrologic <br />Information System (HIS). An overview of MMS is found in the body of this document. An <br />overview of HDB is in attachment A, and an overview of HIS is in attachment B. <br /> <br />OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY AREA <br /> <br />The Gunnison River Basin (figure I) is located in west-central Colorado. The basin has a drainage <br />area of 20,530 square kilometers (km') 0,930 square miles [mi']). The Gunnison River terminates <br />at its confluence with the Colorado River in Grand Junction, Colorado. The Gunnison River is a <br />significant contributor to the Colorado River; 15.5 percent of the natural flow in the Upper <br />Colorado River Basin originates in the Gunnison River Basin.' <br /> <br />I Source: Colorado River Simulation System natural tlow database (1988). <br /> <br />2 <br />