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<br />Watershed Exoeriment. The Board of Atmospheric Sciences Workshop Report (BASC, <br />2001) included a strong recommendation that a "Watershed Experiment" be conducted in <br />the mountainous West, using all available technology and equipment. The NRC report <br />has a similar recommendation with many suggestions for evaluation and requirements for <br />protection of the environment and local water users. There are several western states' <br />watersheds worthy for consideration of such a program. This experiment has not yet <br />been funded. The Basin States could work cooperatively and cost share with other <br />agencies in developing this experiment, or suggest one in Colorado or Utah and work <br />with other agencies to design the experiment. This might be a cost-effective way to gain <br />experience. <br /> <br />Particioate in Onl!oinl( Prol(ram. As stated earlier, the cost of participating in an ongoing <br />program is significantly lower than developing a new one. Other advantages include: <br />use of the data generated during the operating period; an understanding of the costs, and; <br />some indication of the effectiveness of the program. Even if the program is not <br />operational as in the case of the CREST, much of the planning work has been completed, <br />which can be leveraged. That stated, even though some of the needed infrastructure for <br />the cloud seeding part of the program may be present in a basin, it could be argued that in <br />order to optimize operations, one would like to start fresh by evaluating generator <br />positions and likely add new ones to ensure complete coverage of the intended target. All <br />the research equipment needed for a comprehensive physical evaluation would certainly <br />not be in place. A high cost item is manpower to collect and analyze the data from a <br />wide variety of platforms. <br /> <br />Combination of Ooerations and Research. An operational program could be developed <br />or an existing one expanded. Part of any program should include a research or evaluation <br />component. Recently, the state of Wyoming (see above) has taken it upon itself to <br />initiate WxMod evaluation experiments, without assistance from federal or other <br />agencies. The Wyoming evaluation component includes statistical evaluation of <br />snowpack data in seeded versus non-seeded areas, or a historical versus seeded approach, <br />modeling studies, and real-time SL W verification, among other things. Another option <br />would be to piggy-back additional research onto an existing project since even the <br />relatively large Wyoming budget may not be adequate to perform detailed physical <br />studies. <br /> <br />Identification of Target Areas <br /> <br />In the Colorado River Basin, two areas to consider would be those that the CREST <br />originally targeted with high priority (Grand Mesa in Colorado and Wasatch Plateau in <br />Utah). A good reason to choose these sites is that much of the work in assessing their <br />usefulness has already been defined. The CREST planning document (001, 1993) also <br />identified 23 secondary experimental areas in the states of Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and <br />Arizona. However, since the project was not completed, there are no statistically <br />significant results that can be used for the purposes of this paper. However, the physical <br />studies done in these areas are more valuable than statistical ones, and since none of the <br />areas have statistical results, these original project areas have a big advantage. <br /> <br />-24- <br />