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Discovery and Innovation for a Resilient Water Future

The UC WATER Security and Sustainability Research Initiative is focused on strategic research to build the knowledge base for better water-resources management. Unprecedented climate change, population growth and changing landcover are radically altering the water cycle, with dramatic impacts on human and environmental uses of water. In 2015 the University of California established the UC WATER Initiative to address these issues. UC WATER brings researchers together from multiple University of California campuses—Berkeley, Davis, Merced, Santa Cruz, San Diego, and CITRIS.

UC WATER initiatives:

  • UC WATER is developing innovative, quantitative water accounting and analysis methods, and introducing modern information systems into California’s aging infrastructure. Current water policy lacks salient, credible, and legitimate water information forcing policymakers to rely on century-old technology and analysis techniques.
  • UC WATER will improve our understanding of the way water flows through the natural environment, and how it is extracted, conveyed and stored in built and natural infrastructure. This initiative also contributes to research by developing understanding of landcover changes on source-water areas, and tools and techniques for better groundwater management.
  • UC WATER tightly weaves legal and policy research into our findings. Our research will help facilitate more integrated water management institutions in California and aid in the development of the capacity to adapt to 21st-century stressors.

Publications

  • B. Kerkez, S.D. Glaser, R.C. Bales, M.W. Meadows, Design and performance of a wireless sensor network for catchment-scale snow and soil moisture measurements, Wat. Resour. Res.,48, doi: 10.1029/2011WR011214, 2012. Link

  • D. E. Rheinheimer and J. H. Viers (2015), Combined Effects of Reservoir Operations and Climate Warming on the Flow Regime of Hydropower Bypass Reaches of California's Sierra Nevada. River Res. Applic., 31: 269–279. doi: 10.1002/rra.2749. Link

  • G. Kallis. M. Kiparsky, R. Norgaard. Collaborative governance and adaptive management: Lessons from California’s CALFED Water Program. Environmental Science and Policy. 12 (2009) 631-643. Link

  • M Kiparsky, D. L. Sedlak, B. H. Thompson, Jr., B. Truffer. The Innovation Deficit in Urban Water: The Need for an Integrated Perspective on Institutions, Organizations, and Technology. Environmental Engineering Science. 30 (8) 2013. DOI: 10.1089/ees.2012.0427 Link

  • M. Kiparsky, A. Milman, S. Vicun. Climate and Water: Knowledge of Impacts to Action on Adaptation. Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour. 2012. 37:163–94. doi: 10.1146/annurev-environ-050311-093931 Link

  • M.L. Goulden, R.C., Bales. Mountain runoff vulnerability to increased evapotranspiration with vegetation expansion.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1319316111, 2014. Link

  • S. E. Null and J. H. Viers (2013), In bad waters: Water year classification in nonstationary climates, Water Resour. Res., 49, doi:10.1002/wrcr.20097 . Link

  • T. E. Grantham and J. H. Viers. (2014), 100 years of California's water rights system: patterns, trends and uncertainty. Environ. Res. Lett. 9 084021 doi:10.1088/1748-9326/9/8/084012. Link