Earth Observation-integrated Water Quality Modeling System for the United States
Abstract
Leveraging remotely sensed Earth observations to estimate freshwater quality has emerged as a primary earth science topic. Recent data products such as AquaSat demonstrate the feasibility of integrating coincident field observations and satellite imagery to improve water quality assessments across large spatial scales. While these efforts are filling long-standing data gaps, limitations persist. For example, estimates derived from Landsat, MODIS, and VIIRS imagery are mostly limited to sediment and chlorophyll a. There is also a spatial scale issue: most of the recent Earth observation-based data are limited to large lakes, rivers, and estuaries, leaving numerous small streams unmonitored. We envision a next-generation National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) water quality mission that can address these limitations. To this end, a recent continental-scale model interoperability initiative demonstrates unprecedented capabilities of integrating the NASA Land Information System with a process-based ecohydrological model across the Mississippi River Basin (MRB) in the United States that can produce daily estimates of nitrate, sediment, and stream temperature at river-reach scales. Preliminary results from the integrated model show notable improvements in traditional predictions of nitrogenous pollution across the MRB. In this presentation, we will discuss these recent advances, present case studies, and outline a potential future pathway towards new tools, services, and applications that may lead to an operational global water quality prediction system.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2022
- Bibcode:
- 2022AGUFM.H36G..07R