Establishing data management workflows to develop and implement a database architecture for Sustainable Groundwater Management data from multiple geographies and organizations.
Data fragmentation is one of the most challenging aspects of water governance and research. Data about water management organizations, infrastructure projects, permits, hydrological features, water supply, and water quality are collected via different systems, over different geographies, and at different timescales. This collaboration between DataLab and researchers in UC Davis’ Environmental Science and Policy department is establishing data management workflows to develop and implement a database architecture that can be used to assemble water data at different levels of aggregation, extend to new datasets, visualize and map data in different ways for policy stakeholders, and eventually become available to other researchers and government agencies. This Start-Up project focuses on sustainable groundwater management datasets, specifically the 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) in California. SGMA is one of the most important water management activities in California and an extensive experiment in developing new institutions for water policy and management. This project integrates data from multiple geographies and organizations related to SGMA, including but not limited to groundwater basins, water districts, management plans, and individual stakeholders.
DataLab team: Michele Tobias (technical lead), Naomi Kalman, Pamela Reynolds, Carl Stahmer
Water data team: The water data expert team is led by Professors Mark Lubell and Tyler Scott, with engagement from graduate students Darcy Bostic, Kristin Dobbin, Amanda Fencel (UC Davis Geography PhD 2019, currently postdoc at Texas A&M University), Linda Mendez Barriento, and Rich Pauloo (UC Davis Hydrology PhD 2020).
Top image is an aerial view from 2500 feet looking south of the Dutch Slough Tidal Marsh Restoration Project in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta near Oakley, CA taken by Ken James (CA Department of Water Resources).
