Eastern Seaboard states to get drought-monitoring tool as part of NOAA grant

Water-resource officials in states along the Eastern Seaboard will be better able to monitor drought using a tool designed by a team of University of South Carolina researchers and funded by the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The GIS (geographic-information system) tool is web-based and calculates drought and displays data visually. It will allow policymakers and decision makers, from hydroelectric-dam operators to state climatologists to fishermen, incorporate climate data into their decisions about water, from its use to its loss.

A $250,000 grant from NOAA is making the application of the new technology possible in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia and Florida.

“When people think of hazards, they typically think of a single, devastating event,” said Dr. Greg Carbone, lead investigator on the project. “However, the largest dollar-loss hazard in our country is drought.”

The research team, comprising geographers Carbone and Dr. Kirsten Dow and biologist Dr. Dan Tufford, along with Jinyoung Rhee, a post-doctoral geography researcher, and Hope Mizzell, South Carolina state climatologist and graduate student, created the tool as part of a $1.1 million NOAA award in 2007. The team has been working closely with state climatologists, as well as water-resource managers in the Carolinas who have used the technology successfully to manage water resources in the Catawba/Wateree basin, an area of rivers and streams that has been surrounded by debate over water control between the two states.

The University of South Carolina is regarded as a national leader in GIS and hazards research. It has one of eight NOAA-funded research centers in the United States, called the Carolinas Integrated Sciences and Assessments.

For more information about the center, visit the Web site: www.cas.sc.edu/geog/cisa/. For more information about the university’s geography department, visit: www.cas.sc.edu/geog/index.html.