Texas environmental flow standards and the hydrology-based environmental flow regime methodology

Abstract

In 2007, the Texas legislature created a program to identify environmental flow standards statewide through the coordinated efforts of scientific and stakeholder groups and rulemaking by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. To aid in this task, a Hydrology-based Environmental Flow Regime (HEFR) method was developed that combines a suite of user-customizable hydrologic statistics with an implementation framework. Following the concepts of the Natural Flow Paradigm, the methodology includes the separation of a long-term hydrograph into key flow components (e.g. subsistence, base, high-flow pulse and overbank) defined by the Texas Instream Flow Program. Seasonal, annual and inter-annual flow component statistics were then coupled with biology, water quality and geomorphology overlays, where available, and with implementation rules applied to example large-scale water supply projects to support development of environmental flow standards for use in water rights permit conditions. The HEFR methodology and resulting flow recommendations are compared to two contemporary in-stream flow studies and adopted environmental flow standards. Subsistence flows were fairly similar. Baseflows were in a similar range, but fewer than three seasonal levels have sometimes been specified in in-stream flow studies. Episodic events are quite different in terms of magnitude, frequency, duration and applicable number.

Editor D. Koutsoyiannis; Guest editor M. Acreman

Citation Opdyke, D.R., Oborny, E.L., Vaugh, S.K., and Mayes, K.B., 2014. Texas environmental flow standards and the hydrology-based environmental flow regime methodology. Hydrological Sciences Journal, 59 (3–4), 820–830.     

象山港流域河流形态特征定量分析

象山港流域发育有自低山流向海洋的众多山溪型河流,形成相对独立的小流域。本文采用流域地貌数学模型与地理信息系统技术相结合的方法,对港湾内小尺度河流特征进行了定量分析。结果表明:(1)象山港流域河流的河长分维值普遍较小,大嵩江的河长最长且主河道最为蜿蜒曲折;(2)凫溪和大嵩江的水系结构较象山港流域其它河流的结构更为复杂且发育更加充分;(3)除了颜公河和钱仓河外,流域内大部分河流纵剖面线呈现下凹型且主河道有多次阶梯状起伏;(4) 基岩性S-A模型的应用具有一定的局限性,凫溪和大嵩江的基岩河床处于均衡状态。     

国家级导航地理框架数据库建设

围绕基础地理信息如何真正在导航产业中发挥其社会基础平台的作用,本文首先提出了问题的解决方案是充分利用基础地理信息的资源,建设导航地理框架数据库,然后对导航地理框架数据的数据模型和内容进行了定义,最后提出了导航框架数据持续性发展在政策、运作模式等方面的关键技术以及建议。     

Revealing the natural complexity of topographic change processes through repeat surveys and decision‐tree classification

Topographic change processes (TCPs) are the mechanisms by which a landscape is interpreted to be experiencing landform deformation, and are defined by the specific actions occurring within a contiguous, localized region that cause sediment to be either deposited or eroded. Past topographic change studies have mostly been focused at the site scale. The goal of this study was to identify and delineate spatially explicit TCP types across the valley width in a 34‐km long cobble‐gravel river at the scale of one‐tenth of the bankfull channel width over a period of seven to nine years. To accomplish this, a new procedure was developed that analyzes spatial patterns of topographic change evident from differencing two raster digital elevation models and accounting for sources of uncertainty, then identifying and classifying those changes using a decision tree framework that invokes the locations of those changes as they relate to the locations of specific geographic characteristics. Once mapped, TCP polygons were analyzed for areal patterns and volumetric rates of change. Results showed that 19 unique TCP types occurred and that they have organized but complex spatial patterns. Within this study segment, overbank storage processes occurred over the most area and displaced the most net volume of sediment, while cohesive bank retreat created the largest net change in topographic elevations. Analyses of the TCPs reveal that the regulated lower Yuba River (LYR) is not experiencing the expected combination of channel incision and floodplain deposition commonly reported below dams. Instead, the LYR is a dynamic valley that is still adjusting valley‐wide to the upstream dam with a diverse suite of processes that cause the channel and floodplains to scour and fill in concert. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The job of the river

Earth scientists have traditionally conceptualized rivers and streams as geomorphic machines, whose role is to transfer sediment and to sculpt the landscape. Steady‐state relationships between sediment supply and transport capacity have traditionally been considered normative in fluvial systems. Rivers are hydrological entities, however, whose function is to redistribute excess moisture on land. The geomorphic work of the river – erosion, transport, deposition, etc. – is a byproduct of the hydrological job of the river. There is therefore no reason to expect any particular relationship between sediment supply and transport capacity to develop as a normative condition in fluvial systems. The apparent steady‐state equilibrium slope adjustments of rivers are a byproduct of four basic phenomena: (1) hydraulic selection, which favors channels and branching networks over other flux patterns; (2) water flows along the available path of least resistance; (3) energy dissipation; and (4) finite relaxation times. Recognizing converging trends of stream power or slope and sediment supply as common (but far from inevitable) side effects rather than self‐regulation has important implications for interpreting and predicting fluvial systems, and for river management and restoration. Such trends are variable, transient, contingent, and far from universal. Where they occur, they are an emergent byproduct of fundamental physical mechanisms, not a goal function or attractor state. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Climate change and sediment flux from the Roof of the World

Potential rises in global temperature are likely to have major impacts on high altitude environments, including glacier recession and permafrost degradation. In turn, these could have far‐reaching impacts on riverine sediment flux. Such impacts are emerging in the Himalayas and Tibet Plateau region, one of the world's largest and most environmentally‐sensitive cold regions. Closer monitoring is urgently required to track changing trends of sediment load from the interactions of glacial recession treat, rainfall changes and human interventions, and to study the implications of such changes for the large Asian river systems of the region. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed is the article: Small-State Security in the Balkans . Aurel Braun. South American Development: A Geographical Introduction . Rosemary D. F. Bromley and Ray Bromley. Interregional Migration, National Policy and Social Justice . Gordon L. Clark. Marketing Architectural and Engineering Services . Weld Coxe. A Geography of the Third World . J. P. Dickenson, C. G. Clarke, W. T. S. Gould, R. M. Prothero, D. J. Siddle, C. T. Smith, E. M. Thomas-Hope, and A. G. Hodgkiss. Wildlife and Man in Texas: Environmental Change and Conservation . Robin W. Doughty. At the Sea's Edge . William T. Fox. Englewood Cliffs Geography and Ecology . I. P. Gerasimov. Urbanization in Contemporary Latin America. Critical Approaches to the Analysis of Urban Issues . Alan Gilbert in association with Jorge E. Hardoy and Ronaldo Ramírez, eds. The Coming of the Transactional City . Jean Gottmann. College Park Visions of City and Country: Prints and Photographs of Nineteenth-Century France . Bonnie L. Grad and Timothy A. Riggs. Worcester Soviet Geography Today: Physical Geography . N. A. Gvozdetskiy, ed. Adaptive Responses of Native Amazonians . Raymond B. Hames and William T. Vickers, eds. Urban and Regional Industrial Research: The Changing UK Data Base . Michael Healey, ed. Cuando se Acaban los Montes . Stanley Heckadon Moreno. A Panama Forest and Shore: Natural History and Amerindian Culture in Bocas del Toro . Burton L. Gordon. Pacific Grove Mozambique: From Colonialism to Revolution, 1900–1982 . Allen Isaacman and Barbara Isaacman. Soviet Natural Resources in the World Economy . Robert G. Jensen, Theodore Shabad, and Arthur W. Wright, eds. The Changing Geography of the United Kingdom . R. J. Johnston and J. C. Doornkamp, eds. Pluralism and Political Geography—People, Territory and State . Nurit Kliot and Stanley Waterman, eds. Landmarks Preservation and the Property Tax . David Listokin. Irrigation Horticulture in Highland Guatemala: The Tablón System of Panajachel . Kent Mathewson. Her Space, Her Place: A Geography of Women . Mary Ellen Mazey and David R. Lee. Man, A Geomorphological Agent . Dov Nir. Dordrecht The Book of America: Inside the 50 States Today . Neal R. Peirce and Jerry Hagstrom. Rivers . Geoffrey E. Petts. Proceedings, United States/Australia Workshop on Design and Implementation of Computer-Based Geographic Information Systems . Donna Peuquet and John O'Callaghan, eds. Outdoor Recreational and Resource Management . John Pigram. Remaking the City: Social Science Perspectives on Urban Design . John S. Pipkin, Mark La Gory and Judith R. Blau, eds. The Crust of Our Earth: An Armchair Traveler's Guide to the New Geology . Chet Raymo. Englewood Cliffs Concepts and Themes in the Regional Geography of Canada J. Lewis Robinson. Vancouver Secondary Cities in Developing Countries: Policies for Diffusing Urbanization . Dennis A. Rondinelli. Beverly Hills Legal Foundations of Environmental Planning , Vol 1. J. G. Rose. Can We Delay a Greenhouse Warming? Stephen Seidel and Dale Keyes. Mobilizing Human Resources in the Arab World . R. Paul Shaw. Prairie Mosaic: An Ethnic Atlas of Rural North Dakota . William C. Sherman. The Future of Conflict in the 1980s . William J. Taylor, Jr. and Steven A. Maaranen, eds. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information . Edward R. Tufte. U.S. 40 Today: Thirty Years of landscape Change in America . Thomas R. Vale and Geraldine R. Vale. Madison Silent Violence: Food, Famine and Peasantry in Northern Nigeria . Michael Watts. Readings in Historic Preservation: Why? What? How? Norman Williams Jr., Edmund Kellogg and Frank Gilbert, eds.     

Research progress of international rivers in China

China possesses over 110 international rivers and lakes, among which 41 are major ones and 15 are of great importance. With the highest concentration of international rivers, the northeast, northwest and southwest regions of China enjoy abundant transboundary resources and pose complicated ecological security issues. Following the 1950s, relevant studies on international rivers fall into three periods: 1) the planned economy period of the 1950s–1980s when border development and basic research were scant; 2) the reform and opening-up period from 1980 to the end of 20th century. Along with the drive of economic globalization and regional cooperation, development of international rivers was thriving, which filled blanks in the research and narrowed gaps with international standards. Relevant studies also provided national and local governments with important scientific grounds for making decisions; 3) since the start of the 21st century, China has integrated its international river studies across sectors and across international borders. Now both government and scientific institutions pay great attention to transboundary environmental issues.     

人为季节性河流的初步研究

由于人类引水量的激增,我国北方的一些天然常流河频繁断流,已经成为季节性河流。文中提出了人为季节河的概念,在分析天然常流河与天然季节河的形成条件的基础上,查明了人为季节河形成的敏感带和在这种敏感带中,常流河向季节河转化的条件。