Incorporation of Modern Web-based Workflows to Improve Researcher-Utility Collaboration in Water Resources Planning: an Example from San Francisco
Abstract
Water resources researchers routinely engage with utilities, stakeholders and policy makers to inform policy decisions. Despite this, the degree of engagement can be significantly limited by the technical tools available for collaboration. We have been engaging with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) to assess the vulnerability of San Francisco's regional water supply system to a wide range of potential vulnerability threats to inform long-term infrastructure management policy. The complexity and scope of the effort, combined with a desire for the SFPUC to maintain close technical collaboration, has necessitated the use of a wide range of tools, both established and innovative, to maximize collaboration efficiency. We describe our collaboration workflow and related innovations, which broadly comprises 1) traditional modes of ongoing communication (e.g., email and video calls), 2) traditional more formal communications (e.g., regular reports, technical memos, etc.) and 3) several collaboration-centric web applications that support the core technical effort. The web applications have proven particularly instrumental, and include applications for code/project management (GitLab), water system modeling (OpenAgua), and documentation/record-keeping (Google Docs). These web applications also facilitate collaboration and policy assessment over the long term, as they are designed to be used, with anticipated continual development, beyond the immediate vulnerability assessment project by future researchers. The benefits and pitfalls of these technical tools and communication channels for managing both research generally and the researcher-utility collaboration in particular are presented.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018AGUFM.H54F..08R
- Keywords:
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- 1880 Water management;
- HYDROLOGYDE: 6324 Legislation and regulations;
- POLICY SCIENCESDE: 6344 System operation and management;
- POLICY SCIENCESDE: 6620 Science policy;
- PUBLIC ISSUES