3. Northern Water East Slope of Rocky Mountains in northeastern Colorado
1.6 million acres (652,000 ha) in eight counties
Contracting entity for repayment of irrigation component of Colorado – Big Thompson (C-BT) Project

4. Colorado – Big Thompson Project
$160 million construction cost
12 reservoirs/lakes
3 pumping plants
7 hydro-electric power plants
99 miles (160 km) of canals
640,000 irrigated acres (259,000 ha)
220,000 ac-ft (270 m3 x106) average annual deliveries
$370 million/year agricultural production
721,000 population

5. Northern Water’s Weather Station Network
Mark Crookston
June Caves
Tim Lynch
Mary Hattendorf

6. Weather Station Network
Provides weather & crop water use information throughout service area
21 automated stations – 19 on eastern plains, 2 on west slope at high elev
Solar powered
CDMA modems: presently downloaded hourly, moving to more frequent
Station sites carefully selected –in alfalfa fields or large turf areas
Air temperature, relative humidity, rain/precipitation, wind speed/direction, solar radiation & soil temperature
Every sensor serviced & calibrated at least annually

7. Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District Weather Station Network
Provides crop water use information for northeastern Colorado

8. ET Reference ASCE Standardized Penman-Monteith equation
Hourly calculations: ETrs for alfalfa & ETos for turf grass
Daily (available now), weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly data aggregations available via web (soon).
ETrs is factored using coefficients based on crop growth stages for all major crops grown in the area

9. Where are the Data? Internet Call Center
weather, ET & maps
Internet
local
(NoCoH2O) toll-free
Call Center

12. Map is not selectable. All data selected is default
Map is not selectable. All data selected is default. Data and station selections ‘stick’ on next visit.

16. 16 crops--

19. Web Enhancements Web services Charting New time aggregations Weekly
Monthly
Quarterly
Annual

20. Web Services REST services
Representational State—can represent what you want in a URL
Much simpler than some protocols
Get away from s and ftp transfers
NW web services modeled on USGS REST services
Helps a client configure a data transfer
Designed for client to server automated data transfers

21. Web Services

22. Web Services

23. Web Services

24. Web Services

25. Web Services
Need some programming/configuration at client end to take advantage of web services—
data are delivered in XML format
Builds URL from the information selected in the previous screens
Users need an account (free)
Notifications in case of problems
Must read our Data Policy
Track activity--in case a client job overwhelms our servers, we can shut a job down
https site—secure data transfer

26. Web Services Two date styles Relative (last 30 days, last 7 days, etc)
Exact date range
Northern may limit data and date requests to avoid server overload
Web services should be done sometime this week
Rest.ncwcd.org

27. Data Aggregations
Weekly
Monthly
Quarterly
Annual

28. Historical Data Currently data are from present to 2008
As QAQC progresses, more years of data will be available via the web interface

29. Period of Record

30. Charting Y1 and Y2 axes Plot like units on each axis
Coming in the next few weeks
Y1 and Y2 axes
Plot like units on each axis
Multiple variables per station
Berthoud Y1 = Air temperature and Dewpoint T
Berthoud Y2 = Solar radiation
Multiple stations per variable
Berthoud, Fort Collins, and Boulder air temperatures
All data aggregations available

31. Crop Water Use Reports Still in old text format
2012--database driven—GDD based crop curves
Troubleshooting and adjusting this year
Crop report enhancements—coming year?
Interactive
Field-specific customization
Irrigation budget
Crop types & maturity
Soil data
Irrigation method

32. Turf Water Use Reports
2012-enhanced report
Range of DU & precipitation rates
Supply suggested sprinkler run-times
Goal is to provide better guidance and education urban lawn irrigation
Interactive run-time scheduler pending this year?
Next year?

33. Northern Water Weather Station Network
In May 2010, the Boulder Flatirons and Boulder East weather station were dropped from the network
Stations owned by City of Boulder
Instruments and Campbell logger were obsolete
Station sites compromised

34. Boulder East
Prairie dogs
No irrigation
No green fetch

35. Boulder Flatiron Distance from tall trees inadequate
Tree casting a shadow over the station

36. Sensor Calibration Every sensor checked & calibrated every year
Air Temperature
Relative Humidity
Rain – tipping bucket gauge
Precipitation – weighing bucket gauge
Wind Speed
Wind Direction
Solar Radiation
Soil Temperature

37. Stations Moved

38. Brush Move

39. Crook Move

40. Eaton Move

41. Longmont West Move

42. Ovid Moves

43. Sterling Move

44. Wiggins Move

45. New Weather Stations West slope Shadow Mountain Reservoir Lake Granby
Support water quality modeling

46. Shadow Mountain Res No heated tipping bucket yet 3-D sonic anemometer
Shadow Mountain Dam
No heated tipping bucket yet
3-D sonic anemometer
R.M. Young 81000
Resolve vertical wind gradients
R.M. Young Wind Monitor, Alpine version
10 m

47. Lake Granby Site
Installation 2012
10 m
Site near Farr Pump Plant