The Bureau of Reclamation and the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) today released a beta version of an updated water resources and water supply reliability planning tool for review and comment. Water managers in California use the model a known as CalSim a to examine operations of the interconnected Central Valley Project (CVP) and State Water Project (SWP) given assumptions for hydrology conditions, project facilities, and regulatory criteria.
The beta version is being provided to the public so that stakeholders and other external technical experts can review it and provide comments before the model is finalized. A final version is expected in the fall of 2018.
This month, a beta version of the Sacramento portion of the CalSim 3.0 model has been made available. The beta version of the San Joaquin portion will be released shortly thereafter.
Water managers in California currently use the CalSim-II model. CalSim 3.0 updates will include:
a c Basin-wide consistency and a higher level of detail in hydrologic network and hydrology input development;
a c Internal linkage to groundwater model files supported by DWR;
a c Higher level of detail and accuracy in rainfall-runoff, evapotranspiration, groundwater flow, and river seepage representation;
a c New areas of simulation coverage (e.g. new watersheds and streams);
a c Extension of hydrologic data through Water Year 2015;
a c A georeferenced schematic.
Once finalized, the new version of CalSim will have improved ability to assess potential system changes, such as those to infrastructure, operating or regulatory criteria, Central Valley land uses, or climate.
The CalSim 3.0 model and associated documentation is available for download at http://baydeltaoffice.water.ca.gov/modeling/hydrology/CalSim3/index.cfm and a free training workshop will be offered by Reclamation and DWR. Registration details for the training workshop will also be available at the above link.
