Evaluating the Effects of U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve Expansion

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is evaluating the development of new salt cavern storage sites in the Gulf of Mexico region to increase the capacity of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). Salt caverns are created from underground salt domes. A well is drilled into a salt formation and fresh water is injected into the well to dissolve the salt. The resultant brine is then pumped out of the well and discharged. One location under study is the Richton salt dome, which will create an increase in storage capacity of 160 million barrels of crude oil. An option being evaluated for this proposed site is to withdraw freshwater from the Pascagoula River and discharge the brine to the Gulf of Mexico. ASA was contracted by ICF International, the firm preparing the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for the DOE, to assess the effects of water withdrawal from the River and the discharge of brine to the Gulf.

The Pascagoula River is one of the only undisturbed rivers to flow into the Gulf of Mexico. The River provides abundant wildlife habitat as well as a variety of estuarine habitats along the southern portion where it is influenced by salt water intrusion from Mississippi Sound. Withdrawing freshwater from the River will reduce the River flow, which could result in saline water from the Sound to travel further up the River potentially causing adverse effects to the estuarine and river ecosystems. ASA assessed the present environmental conditions in the Pascagoula River and then estimated how the salinity distribution may be affected by the freshwater withdrawal at the proposed site 130 km upstream from the Gulf of Mexico. A salinity intrusion model was used by ASA to estimate the potential changes in the River’s salinity structure under various river flow conditions.

The proposed Richton brine discharge area is located in the Gulf of Mexico south of the barrier islands of the Gulf Islands National Seashore, the defining boundary of the Mississippi Sound a highly valued habitat area. The two proposed sites for the brine discharge are 20 and 30 km offshore in water depths of 14 and 17 m, respectively. The brine will be discharged through a multiport diffuser to maximize the dilution of the high salinity water to near ambient levels. ASA assessed the transport and fate of the brine discharges using two modeling approaches, one to predict the currents in the area and a second to predict both the near-field and far-field transport and dilution of the brine The near-field model predicted the local dynamics and initial dilution of the brine plume as it exited the discharge structure, and the far-field model predicted the ultimate dilution as the plume was transported from the site by currents and density driven flow.

Results of this study are available on DOE’s website: Salinity Intrusion Modeling Study | Brine Discharge Modeling Study

For more information about this project contact Craig Swanson (cswanson@asascience.com).

Web-based Larval Transport Model

Predicted transport of larvae released from a spawning ground, red particles represents larvae and the polygon represents the spawning ground.

ASA was contracted by NOAA’s EcoFOCI program in Seattle, WA to develop a web-based tool that calculates particle trajectories utilizing external Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS) circulation fields hosted by THREDDS servers. The web-based tool, LarvaMap, leverages distributed computing and open standards to simulate passive long-term and large-scale larval fish transport.

The front end of LarvaMap uses an Adobe Flex thin client with the OpenScales mapping Application Programming Interface (API), to provide an exploratory map interface, and access to the Environmental Data Server (EDS) and metocean Web Map Services (WMS) for contextual wind and current data. The user defines larval release parameters, including temporal extent, release duration, number of particles, and species type. Utilizing a Java-based distributed data retrieval and model processing backend, the larval transport model runs as a service, dynamically accessing oceanographic data from distributed THREDDS servers.

The project is funded by NOAA’s High Performance Computing and Communications office (HPCC) and will be used to evaluate how distributed services-based systems can be used to improve computationally intensive science projects. The LarvaMap system will also be deployed on one or more cloud computing architectures. LarvaMap is a good application to test both the computing aspects of the cloud and the storage and transport of large datasets needed to run models. In addition to deploying the system in the cloud, future developments include additional inputs for defining species and adding in larval fish behaviors, such as vertical migration.

For more information, please contact Tiffany Vance at NOAA (Tiffany.C.Vance@noaa.gov).

Chesapeake Bay Inundation Prediction System

Regional Atmospheric Modeling forecast data displayed in the CBOS web-based tool.

The Chesapeake Inundation Prediction System (CIPS) is being developed through partnerships of the Chesapeake Bay Observing System (CBOS) to provide a forecast capability to local National Weather Service Offices in the Chesapeake Bay area to better predict storm surge and inundation in the Chesapeake Bay associated with tropical storms. ASA was contracted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Chesapeake Bay Office to focus on data Integration, management, and interoperability using IOOS standards. The Mid Atlantic Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association (MACOORA) co-funded the project to leverage the work being performed by the regional scientists with the national projects being coordinated by the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS).

There are five meteorological forecasts being produced for the CIPS project from 4 different providers, including NOAA and Weatherflow. ASA worked with NOAA to develop a web-based system for CBOS that harvests these forecast data sets and provides a common access point for hydrodynamic modelers to utilize the CIPS resources. By providing “one stop shopping” through CBOS to multiple meteorological forecasts using open standards, the modelers can select different forcing conditions for ensemble modeling. In addition, CBOS ingests data from more than 900 in-situ observational stations throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed that are used to validate and compare CIPS model results with actual conditions. The aggregated model data and observational data are available on the web and are exposed using open standards (NetCDF, Thredds, OGC WMS and SOS) for data access and mapping. The funding for CIPS was provided through a grant from the NOAA IOOS Program.

The project is funded by NOAA’s High Performance Computing and Communications office (HPCC) and will be used to evaluate how distributed services-based systems can be used to improve computationally intensive science projects. The LarvaMap system will also be deployed on one or more cloud computing architectures. LarvaMap is a good application to test both the computing aspects of the cloud and the storage and transport of large datasets needed to run models. In addition to deploying the system in the cloud, future developments include additional inputs for defining species and adding in larval fish behaviors, such as vertical migration.

For more information on the Chesapeake Bay Inundation System, please contact Elizabeth Smith (exsmith@odu.edu) or Doug Wilson (doug.wilson@noaa.gov), and for information on Macoora, please contact Judith Krauthamer (judith.krauthamer@macoora.org).

Travelling Science Exhibition Provides Flooding Visualization Kiosks

Museum visitors interact with a prototype activity kiosk where they control a fly-over of Boston, toggling between unflooded and flooded conditions that would occur as a result of a nor’easter with storm surge.

An interactive science exhibit demonstrating the potential flooding impacts from climate change, called Seasons of Change: Global Warming in Your Backyard, will tour science centers and museums throughout the Northeastern U.S. The exhibit consists of kiosks that provide hands-on interaction for visitors to see precisely how their local cities would be impacted by increased flooding caused by sea-level rise and coastal storms. The Seasons of Change software was built by ASA as a stand-alone application for the kiosks. The software uses Google Earth to dynamically display the simulated impacts from various possible flooding events. The interfaces and controls are designed for children as the main audience and users. The kiosks are entirely joystick and console button controlled, and allow users to choose zoom levels (city or neighborhood) and flood elevations as well as to navigate around the view using directional controls. Funded through a grant from the National Science Foundation to Brown University, ASA in collaboration with exhibition planning and design firm Jeff Kennedy Associates, developed this interactive flooding exhibit that highlights the impacts of rising sea levels under different climate change scenarios. The travelling exhibit is a project of Brown University's Center for Environmental Studies and Clean Air-Cool Planet's New England Science Center Collaborative in collaboration with the Environmental Defense Fund.

Kiosk controls

The Seasons of Change software was built by ASA as a stand-alone application for the kiosks. The software uses Google Earth to dynamically display the simulated impacts from various possible flooding events. The Google Earth mapping integration allows the exhibit to access the Google Earth framework, imagery, and three dimensional building models while controlling the level of user interaction. The kiosks take visitors through three water level scenarios: (1) no flooding, (2) flooding from storm surge, and (3) flooding from storm surge and sea level rise.

The interfaces and controls are designed for children as the main audience and users. The kiosks are entirely joystick and console button controlled, and allow users to choose zoom levels (city or neighborhood) and flood elevations as well as to navigate around the view using directional controls. Descriptions of the flood conditions for up to 30 cities and towns around New England are provided.

Screenshot of neighborhood zoom level

The software behind the flooding simulations is Geographic Information System (GIS) based, and makes use of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) National Elevation Dataset (NED) at a 10-meter resolution, supplemented with local topographic surveys where available. “ASA is pleased to be a part of this software development project with Jeff Kennedy Associates to bring flooding GIS visualization into the hands of museum goers” explains Kelly Knee, ASA’s project manager, who built the actual flood models used in the software. “The ability to increase awareness of the potential impacts of sea-level rise can only help with preparation for any worst-case scenarios.”

The touring Seasons of Change exhibit schedule of museums and cities across the Northeast includes:

• Exhibit Debut, January 16 - May 2010: Ecotarium, Worcester, MA
• June - August 2010, McAuliffe-Shephard Discovery Center, Concord, NH
• September - December 2010, Montshire Museum of Science, Norwich, VT
• January - May 2011, Maritime Museum, Bridgeport, CT
• June - September 2011, Squam Lake Nature Center, Ashland, NH
• October 2011 - January 2012, Seacoast Science Center, Rye NH
• January - May 2012, ECHO Lake Aquarium & Science Center, Burlington, VT
• June - August 2012, VINS: Vermont Institute of Natural Science, Quechee, VT
• March - May 2012, Save the Bay, Providence, RI

The tour is scheduled to continue through 2015. For a full exhibit schedule, contact ASA.

The New England exhibit was developed as a template for other regionally-based climate change exhibitions. ASA and Jeff Kennedy Associates will be collaborating on a similar presentation for the North Carolina region in future phases of the project.

ASA’s combination of science, GIS, and modeling has been used to provide inundation models and flood visualizations to many organizations for awareness and civic and emergency planning purposes including National Environmental Trust, Bishop Museum, Union of Concerned Scientists, New York Times, Boston Globe, University of Rhode Island Coastal Resources Center, University of Graz (Austria), Vanity Fair Magazine, and EPA CLIMB Project Team.

For details on flood modeling and visualization and other GIS tools, please contact Kelly Knee (kknee@asascience.com).

ASA recently joined the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) to work with other industry, academic and government organizations to advance the vision of consensus standards that promote the integration and use of geospatial data and services.

New Faces

Andrew Menton joined ASA in the science and programming department as an Engineer. He is proficient with MATLAB data analysis, Dreamweaver Web Design, and Adobe Photoshop. At ASA he will be working on various projects including Arc-GIS modeling, website updating and documentation. Andrew received his Bachelor of Science degree in Information and Communications Engineering from Dublin City University, Ireland in 2008.