BOARD00047 ‎(2)‎

• Board Meeting Date: 9/20/2006
• Description: IWM & D Section - Western Governors Association - The National Integrated Drought Information System - Creating a Drought Early Warning System for the 21st Century
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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Current Tools and Needs

Current efforts at drought management are scattered throughout numerous
federal. state, regional and local agencies. The Department of Agriculture's lUSDA)
Natural Resources Conservation service (NRCS) manages snow pack information,
the Army Corps of Engineers (COE) and Bureau of Reclamation (BOR) manage
reservoir storage data, NOAA manages hydroclimatic data, Interior's Geological
Survey (USGS) has ground water and stream now infonnation, and the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) manages various water quality programs in concert with
the states and tribes. Regional and stale entities also provide considerable data and
information services used for drought analysis in real time. These programs have
generally evolved independently, require separate appropriations and, until recently,
have not been available to users at a central location due to their complexity and
the absence of tools to accomplish data integration.
NIDIS \vill bring together a variety of observations, analysis techniques and fore~
casting methods in an integrated system that will support drought assessment and
decision~making at the lowest geopolitical level possible. The tools will allow users
to access, transfonn and display basic data and forecasts across a range of spatial
and temporal scales most suited to their individual needs. There are four basic types
of drought information tools:

1. Data access tools facilitate the retrieval of data from the different agencies that
collect and archive it.
2. Analysis tools add value to the raw data through computer data transformation,
modeling and statistical analysis.
3. Data display tools enable visual display of raw and analyzed data in ways to
enhance its value to users. Geographic Information System (GIS) sollware
enables the examination of geo-referenced information.
4. Forecast tools are a specialized analysis combining statistical properties of avail-
able observations and models of future developments to make forecasts.

Future Tools

An infrastructure to develop, integrate and maintain a suite of drought decision
support and simulation tools is fundamental for the success of NIDIS. It will be built
on existing institutions with complementary expertise at local, stale, regional and
national levels.

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