DRBC announces flood analysis model status update
Wayne Independent
May 09, 2009
 
UPPER DELAWARE -
Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC)  Executive Director Carol R. Collier on May 5th announced that the flood  analysis model being developed by an interagency team led by the U.S.  Geological Survey (USGS) is now expected to be available sometime this  summer.

[The entire eastern boundary of Wayne County is threatened any time the Delaware River is in danger of flooding.- Editor]

“The USGS and its two federal partners are adapting existing model  applications to develop the flood analysis model for the DRBC,” Collier  said. “While all three agencies are well-versed in the use of these  types of models, it is proving to be more time intensive than originally  expected to represent multiple watersheds and reservoirs, each with  unique characteristics, for a river system as large and diverse as the  Delaware. The agencies understand the need to deliver the model as soon  as possible, but this is a complex undertaking and our foremost goal is  to produce a modeling tool that is scientifically sound.”

The USGS is the lead agency working with the U.S. Army Corps of  Engineers Hydrologic Engineering Center (USACE - HEC) and the National  Weather Service (NWS) to develop the model for DRBC. The model’s  components include rainfall runoff, localized hydrologic conditions, and  snow pack.

When completed, this tool will help the DRBC (a five-member agency  comprised of Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York State, and the  federal government) and the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decree parties (the  four basin states and New York City) to evaluate the potential impacts  that different initial storage levels at 15 major reservoirs would have  had on flooding at forecast points located downstream for the three  storm events experienced in September 2004, April 2005, and June 2006.

Model results will be among the many considerations that inform future  reservoir management and policy decisions focusing on competing water  storage demands in the basin.

Work on the flood analysis model began in August 2007 with $500,000  provided by the four basin state governors. Additional funds and in-kind  services from USGS, NWS, and the USACE have totaled $285,000. It was  among the 45 recommendations identified by the Delaware River Basin  Interstate Flood Mitigation Task Force, formed at the request of the  four governors, in its July 2007 action agenda for a more proactive,  sustainable, and systematic approach to flood damage reduction.

The DRBC was created by compact in 1961 through legislation signed into  law by President John F. Kennedy and the governors of the four basin  states with land draining to the Delaware River. The passage of this  compact marked the first time in our nation’s history that the federal  government and a group of states joined together as equal partners in a  river basin planning, development, and regulatory agency.

Additional information can be found on the commission’s web site at  www.drbc.net.