water in california
DESCRIPTION
Forecasting California Agricultural Water Needs Ramakrishna Nemani & the ECOCAST Team NASA/Ames Research Center Moffett Field, Calif. http://ecocast.arc.nasa.gov Earth System Science at 20 Symposium June 23, 2009. Water in California. Agriculture uses nearly 80% of water resources - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Forecasting California Agricultural Water Needs
Ramakrishna Nemani & the ECOCAST TeamNASA/Ames Research Center
Moffett Field, Calif.
http://ecocast.arc.nasa.gov
Earth System Science at 20 SymposiumJune 23, 2009
Water in California
• Agriculture uses nearly 80% of water resources
• California currently in third year of drought, with snowpack at 63% of normal (as of May 8)
• Large areas of Central valley are left fallow due to water shortages
• Current conditions likely to be typical of future as climate change begins to impact state water supply
• Studies showed better information on irrigation scheduling increased crop yields (8%) and reduced water use (13%)
We need large scale adoption of the water saving technologies
Canopy densityfrom imagery
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Tavg, C
ETo, mm
Ppt, mmWeather data from CIMIS
Crop data from Variety
Irrigation Forecasts for grapevines in Napa and Central Valleys
Weather forecasts from NWS
Forecasting Irrigation Demand
Growers Interacting with Crop Monitoring Tool
• Expanding the study to other regions and crops
• Use of wireless sensor networks will facilitate soil moisture monitoring and weather conditions for use in calibration and validation of irrigation forecasts
• Constellation of satellites providing regular crop assessment
• Delivering and gathering crop information via mobile phones
Next Steps …