6 JUNE 2012 ESTUARY NEWS delta from the Sacramento River, was north. Typically, Old River is saltier than Network Middle River at this location, suggesting TECHNOLOGY call the big “noise” of the tides. At the answered with the installation of the Jersey Point Station, for example, daily Snapshot first hydro-acoustic meter at Freeport the former carries the lion’s share of the water from the western delta. The 14-day peak tidal flows can be on the order The flow station network developed in 1978. A decade later, water manag- Measuring Flow: The Master Variable of 150,000 cubic feet per second (cfs), ers and scientists wanted to monitor average of the sum of the Old and Middle over time in response to a series of River flows is known as OMR and appears while the net flow may be 2,000 cfs or questions. The first question, how the influence of the export facilities Stand on a tule island at the junc- and federal water managers use flow less. According to Burau, this means on the north-to-south movement of in numerous regulatory documents and much fresh water was flowing into the court cases. tion of two delta channels and you’d station network data to make critical continued to page 8 water from central to south delta. So think you could tell which way the daily decisions about how much fresh they installed two more Sutter-Steamboat Corridor - Sutter water was flowing. Surely anything water they can pump to cities and 122°00' 121°45' 121°30' 121°15' acoustic velocity meters at and Steamboat Sloughs are significant that looks so much like a river natu- farms, and when and where. Wildlife Old River at Bacon Island 80 Sacramento conveyance channels that carry, at times, rally flows downstream, from the hills scientists also use this information and at Middle River (1987). half of the water that passes the city of to the sea? But the Delta is not a to protect fish species endangered by Sacramento In the early 1990s, water Sacramento. Sutter Slough carries the one-way system, nor is nature entirely pumping and loss of habitat. In Cali- River project operators installed bulk of the net flow; Steamboat Slough at the controls. Throw in ocean tides fornia’s long history of wrangles over two stations in the Wal- is much more strongly tidally-affected. 38 30' coming in and out, pumps directing water, many resulting court decisions, ° Delta area nut Grove area, so they The flows in both of these channels are FPT water from here to there, and sea- biological opinions, and water qual- San San Joaquin could find out how much strongly influenced by Sacramento River sonal ups and downs, and the only ity standards have become, to some Francisco Freeport flows and Delta Cross Channel gate opera- River ater water was flowing from people who can really tell which way extent, reliant on the numbers spit out the Sacramento River into tions. Hydrodynamics data gathered from er the water is flowing at any given time by the flow stations. Riv the central Delta through SUT and STM is important in the study of or place aren’t standing on a tule the Delta Cross Channel salmon outmigration. The one number everyone has Ship Channel Sutter/ island. They’re sitting in a dark room and Georgiana Slough, the Yolo Bypass – The flows entering the staring at computer screens showing wanted from these submerged out- Steamboat Sacramento Deep W so-called Delta Transfer posts scattered throughout the delta is delta from the Yolo Bypass are computed the minute-by-minute measurements Elk Slough HoodCorridor Flow. Finally, a combina- the ‘”net flow, or the amount of water as the flow in Cache Slough (CCH), minus of the USGS flow station network. tion of four stations in the the flow in Miner Slough (MIN). The com- flowing in a channel with the tidal flows SUT 5 er south delta were installed putation also measures the tidal and net The network is pretty comprehen- averaged out. In the early days, getting Delta onsumnes Sutt C to estimate delta flow to exchanges into the Liberty Island/Cache sive. Over three decades, and with the this number involved a lot more than a Slough Transfer Slough the export pumps. Below is Slough region, an area slated for sig- help of various state and local agen- few clicks on a key pad. The technology MIN WGA STM Flow a description of the groups nificant restoration efforts. Moreover this cies, USGS has installed 33 stations at to measure the pulse of fresh water Fairfield Creek 38°15' DWS t M of stations used to address region is one of the few places where delta what scientist Jon Burau calls “every moving through a system overwhelmed WGB DCC okelumne y LIB Island Dr specific regional scale smelt are consistently captured. hydro-dynamically significant flow with twice-daily ocean tides simply did Yolo Bypass GEO eamboa questions. CCH t SFM split or confluence” in the landscape not exist before the mid 1970s. Particu- S NFM Mokelumne River System Exchange - Grand of the delta’s 700 miles of channels larly challenging was to try to extract Delta Outflow -The sum Most of the Sacramento River water that is 12 er iv Mokelumne (see map). Most of these stations this number in the 500 meter wide R of the measured flows from exported south of the delta flows through River System R employ a gizmo called a sideward- channels in the delta. RIO yler Island iv stations at Rio Vista (RIO), the Mokelumne River system. When the Rio Vista T er looking acoustic Doppler current pro- Brannan Staten Island Exchange Three Mile Slough (TMS), San Delta Cross Channel gates are open this But that’s exactly what the state’s Lodi filer, mounted on a piling or channel Threemile Slough Island Andrus Joaquin River at Jersey Point region is essentially riverine, but when the Department of Water Resources Is 12 marker. These devices bounce sound Suisun Marsh to Bouloin Is (JPT) and Dutch Slough (DCH) gates are closed, this system is virtually Salinity TMS MOK LPS (DWR) set out to do in the late 1920s. amen are used to estimate delta tidal. The data from the MOK and LPS waves off particles in the water across Control Gate acr DEC Researchers first stretched a cable S Webb San Joaquin outflow. Delta outflow is a key stations may also be relevant to salmon entire river channels, measuring flow, Tract Venice across the channel, called a tag line, Sherm an FAL Is King River/Central outmigration, and critical in monitoring the also called “discharge,” as a volume Island ORS Mandeville Is Is ecosystem metric because it then attached their boat to the cable. PRI system’s response to the proposed resto- per time (such as cubic feet of water 160 JPT Delta Exchanges is a measure of water received As the boat moved through 12-24 MLD Jersey MRC ration of McCormack-Williamson Tract and per second). Small solar panels power Is 99 by San Francisco Bay (i.e. stations along the cable, they used a 4 Colum bia inputs less exports and con- Staten Island. the sensors, and help them relay the Antioch DCH HOL ORQ Cut S 38°00' Bacon an Joaquin device called a Price AA meter to take Old TRN sumptive use). information they collect to computers Is Turner San Joaquin River/Central individual water velocity measure- Cut in operations rooms and science labs OLD Stockton Delta Transfer Flow - The Delta Exchanges- Exchanges of water ments. By summing the flow curves at Delta Outflow Palm MID throughout California. Tract delta transfer flow is comput- from the San Joaquin River into the central each station between tidal peaks, DWR R Middle River Discovery iv M STK ed as the difference between delta are important for understanding how “We happen to have a flowing produced a snapshot of net discharge Bay er iddle Old & the flows measured at sta- system, and it’s flowing not just in one at that time and place. Roberts the salt and sediment fields evolve. The Middle Island tions WGA and WGB, two flow four stations used to calculate this ex- 4 R direction but it’s flowing every which iver R “These were incredibly labor-in- Rivers ORF iv stations located near Walnut change are Turner Cut (TRN), Middle River way, because of tides, and rivers com- Export Flows er tensive, even Herculean, field efforts, KEY VIC ictoria Grove. The calculation helps north of Mildred Island (MRC), Old River ing together, and pumping,” says Anke Flows V working with multiple boats over 24- Clifton Court Canal Union Island water managers estimate north of Frank’s Tract near the conflu- Mueller-Solger, Lead Scientist of the Flow Stations Forebay the amount of Sacramento ence of the San Joaquin and Mokelumne hour periods, but they did an amazingly GLC Grant Line Canal Interagency Ecological Program for River water that flows into Rivers (OSJ) and False River (FAL). These the Delta Stewardship Council. “Un- accurate job given the technology they Station Groups had,” says USGS scientist Jon Burau. State Water Project DMC the central delta through the exchanges strongly influence the rate of derstanding anything in this system These groups draw data Pumping Plant Mokelumne system (the Delta entrainment of salmon outmigrants into must start with a good understanding 132 Eight decades later in the 2010s, from 22 of the 33 individual Central Valley Project Cross Channel and Georgiana the central delta. of flow, and how that interacts with measuring net flow involves equally, if 37°45' stations in the delta’s flow Pumping Plant Slough). The delta transfer station network. Exports – The partitioning of water enter- more stationary variables like channel not more, complex efforts, but technol- 580 flow is critical for maintain- geometry, physical habitat, sediment ogy and computers do most of the heavy Tracy ing salinity standards in the ing the federal and state export facilities beds, and point sources of pollution. lifting. The biggest challenge overcome central delta. from the various “feeder” channels is obtained from the following stations: Old Flow is a dynamic master variable.” by the hydrodynamics team of the 0 4 8 12 MILES VNR Old and Middle Rivers – River near the Forebay (ORF), Victoria Ca- USGS California Water Science Center, 5 Fresh water flow is also something The sum of the flows at nal (VIC), Grant Line Canal (GLC), and Delta which runs the network, has been to 0 4 8 12 KILOMETERS 25 million Californians rely on — for Vernalis stations OLD and MID Mendota Canal (DMC). drinking and irrigation water — in find a way — through data collection, represent the flow to the what has been called the “most man- math and modeling — to isolate the export facilities from the small signal (net flow) from what they aged watershed in the country.” State Location of USGS-operated flow station sites in the Delta. Source: USGS, CWSC 8 JUNE 2012 9 ESTUARY NEWS P eople REPORT Flow, continued from page 6 “wake-up” signal to the underwater Tract was a net sink, or trap, for fish OUT that to correctly measure the net flow station. As they watched, a beach ball food, and that Mildred Island was a his team has to be accurate in its tidal sized orange buoy leapt out of the net source. You can’t do that without Honoring a Legendary Lady estimates for Jersey Point to within one water into the air right in front of the the flow stations to determine the flux percent. “Even a small bias in our tidal fishermen, then splashed down hard. at those boundaries,” says Sereno. San Francisco Bay has been by the people in Redwood City who “It scared the hell out of them, it was a fortunate in its champions. had battled Mobil, and so proud of estimates can indicate completely er- Station measurements also be- Ebb Tide in terrible trick,” says Burau. Florence LaRiviere, cofounder with how the 1982 Redwood City refer- roneous net flows, possibly in the wrong come useful for entities like the State direction,” he says. Collecting the data is one thing, her husband Philip of Committee to endum went. Audubon’s help was Restoration Water Resources Control Board, or Complete the Refuge, has focused particularly valuable; they paid for a One way the team detects er- using it another. According to IEP’s other regulators, when they are trying Funding Mueller-Solger, the data from the on saving wetlands in the South Bay, full-page ad in the New York Times. rors is by cross-checking data with to determine compliance with flow lobbying for the creation and later flow stations nearby. The team uses flow station network is useful in two objectives, water export standards, and What’s your favorite marsh? Support for conservation is cycli- obvious ways. First, everyone uses it expansion of the Don Edwards San groups of stations, for example, to biological opinions created to protect Francisco Bay Na- Any one I can get to. I cal, says John Woodbury, who worked verify localized inputs and outputs of to calibrate and validate their hydro- the beneficial uses of the system’s wa- particularly like stand- with State Senator Byron Sher to draft dynamic models, not only simpler tional Wildlife Refuge water, and localized “storage.” To get ter and fish. “Real time measurements and blocking develop- ing on the hill at the legislation that enacted the San Fran- more information about what’s going “mass balance” equations like the of flow help us do a number of things,” Fremont refuge head- cisco Bay Area Conservancy Program much-used “Dayflow” calculation of ment at Bair Island on at each location, the team has also says the Board’s Leslie Grober. “They and Mayhews Land- quarters. To the east in 1997. The 1970s exploded with added another gizmo called a “CTD” delta outflow, but also in more sophis- help us to determine compliance with you can see where the federal laws to protect air, water, and ticated 3-D computer models of where ing. A restored tidal to many stations. These devices mea- flow objectives, to adjust flows in real buildings end and the land. Attempts to back the momentum water might flow in the future given marsh in Fremont sure electrical conductivity (salt) and time to make them more functional for refuge begins; to west, with funding fizzled during the Reagan sea level rise, levee failure, or the bears the LaRivieres’ turbidity (sediment in the water). fish, and to decide on future changes name. Most recently, a lot of ponds we own years in the ‘80s, and continued into construction of a new canal to reroute but Cargill still makes the late ‘90s. But in the Bay Area, the Despite all the automation, things based on how species responded to the 88-year-old water around the delta’s biological salt on. Leslie Salt was first decade of the 21st century will go do go wrong with the flow stations. weak spots. “If you don’t have any flow actual recorded flows.” great-grandmother was honored by the going to have a city down in history as a conservation boom “Electronics and water don’t get along Photo: Carin High stations to groundtruth delta models, Regardless of water management’s there. When I went to period thanks to willing taxpayers and too good,” says you lose all faith Environmental Law reliance on the data, only a few of Institute as Wetland Washington I asked my the work of the Conservancy. Burau. Passersby in predicting the flow stations are currently man- kids what to tell people there. They can’t help but be what will hap- Community Leader of the Year in In May, the Conser- dated by the State Board, the agency Washington, DC. said: “Tell them the condominiums curious about pen with new with the regulatory authority over would be marching to the edge of vancy issued a 32-page the bright shiny water projects,” withdrawals of water from the delta. How did you get involved with the water.” report that highlights devices sitting says Deanna wetland conservation? When my an impressive array Mueller-Solger thinks such mandates What’s your most memorable out in the water Sereno, an en- are a two edged sword. On the good husband and I moved from Berkeley of accomplishments on posts. “If the gineer with the to Palo Alto, we found Palo Alto very negotiation? That would be the over the last 15 side, you have long term security and Carruf property near Cushing Bou- fishing’s bad, Contra Costa consistency in monitoring; on the bad hot. In the evening we’d put supper years, including the folks start fooling levard in Fremont. We were trying to permanent pro- Water District. side, as management questions and in a basket and take the kids to the around with our get that just because it was on the tection of nearly technology change, mandates can get edge of the Bay. The road stopped at equipment,” says Though edge of the Bay and seasonal wet- 85,000 acres of in the way of needed updates. the old harbormaster’s house, where Burau. Most of Sereno doesn’t land. I walked out there with some land. Funds from use flow station someone had put a picnic table. It’s the time, USGS One thing scientists from many friends. All of a sudden over a little voter-approved state bond mea- data much for lovely—the marsh in the evening. The can tell if equip- USGS also uses robot boats to monitor flows. The hummock we came upon a vernal sures 12, 40, 50, and 84 flowed through day-to-day dis- agencies agree on now is the need to tide moves the cordgrass, and the ment’s malfunc- ten-foot-long-length of these boats, which are pool. I’d never seen one before. We the Conservancy to support 425 trict operations, “co-locate” data collection. As re- birds cry. Then we learned what was tioning remotely, equipped with acoustic Doppler current profilers, searchers measure variables, such happening to Bay wetlands: sewage got that land. They were going to projects that improved the health of 50 she does use it build on it but went into bankruptcy using telemetry enables them to span the 4-5 foot wave lengths as turbidity, salinity, plankton, or fish outfalls, garbage dumps, salt ponds. creeks and rivers, planned or restored common in wide delta channels without bobbing. for other pur- and a bank in Los Angeles had it. and a “data crawl- numbers, the value of this information In Palo Alto a convention center was 34,793 acres of wetlands, and added er” that looks at The robot boats also maintain a much steadier poses. A couple The bank backed off on developing it 200 miles to four regional trails. course than any heavier, human-controlled vessel. years ago, when is enhanced if they also have informa- planned, covering that lovely marsh key status vari- with concrete. because of local opposition. It turned the district was tion on the hydrodynamic context from out to have endangered species of The report also acknowledges that ables such as the same time and place. electrical power. “If any of our stations building a new drinking water intake Arthur Oglevie, a Santa Clara fairy shrimp. It’s about the last vernal we are on the downside of the fund- fail any of our tests, the crawler sends at Victoria Canal, Sereno was alarmed Experts say the flow station net- County planner, wrote in the Mercury pool habitat near the Bay. ing cycle. “It’s not likely that we’ll see us a text,” he says. Even with all the one day to see a spike in turbidity. work will become even more founda- News: “If you’re worried about what’s these investment levels in the near Sereno checked to see if the spike was happening to the marshes, come to Who else has inspired you? All of future,” said Amy Hutzel, the Conser- remote fail-safes, something’s always tional to delta planning in the future. the biology department at San Jose up when you have 35 stations running coming from up or downstream of the “When we start putting in new con- my office tomorrow at 10 am.” There vancy’s Bay Area manager. The fallout State; they would stand around at from a downsized Conservancy will be 24-7. Burau estimates his techs are nearest flow station. “Since the flow veyance facilities and doing marsh were 20–30 people there; that started and turbidity data are paired, it was city council meetings until 1 AM in felt region wide. out in a boat doing repairs and site restoration, we’re going to change the campaign for the refuge. We went easy to determine that it was com- the morning. And our members are maintenance, and collecting calibra- the hydrodynamics and transport to Representative Don Edwards. “If “The Conservancy Program jump- ing from the opposite direction from wonderful—all volunteers; we have tion data, at least three times a week. processes in the delta dramatically. you people want it, it sounds right to started the San Francisco Bay Trail,” our intake, and that our construction no paid staff. me,” he said. says Laura Thompson, the trail’s In places with a lot of boat or shore- wasn’t the cause,” she says. So what you want to do in that situ- ation is monitor it now, so you know Republicans and Democrats alike What’s ahead for the Committee? project manager. The Program helped line traffic, USGS will sometimes hide The refuge is not complete. There are its flow station entirely underwater Sereno remembers working on a how it works, and then again, when signed on. We went to city councils, fund all phases of many new trail sec- big research study as a graduate stu- you make the change, so you’ll know Kiwanis clubs, everywhere. One missing pieces in Redwood City and tions from conception to construction. by tethering it to an anchor and buoy Newark. Sea level rise has given us system. The buoy has an acoustic dent aimed at tracking phytoplankton what’s happened,” says Burau. ARO mayor called us carpetbaggers, but Now they will plan to fund each phase on two islands. As part of the study, by the meeting’s end he said, “This is new impetus to try to get everything separately. Funds from Prop 84 cov- release catch on it. One time, the USGS Raw data in real-time: Burau’s group put flow sensors and democracy in action.” that hasn’t been built on. One word ered a conceptual study for a nine-mile maintenance team approached one http://cdec.water.ca.gov/ I hear from developers is “balance.” of these cloaked stations to find two CTDs on all seven boundary channels gap between Newark and Fremont, for for Frank’s Tract to measure what was What are you proudest of? That If we’re going to have balance, we’re example, but the buck stopped there. fishermen, rods up, beers open, parked Quality assured data: we not only have the refuge but went going to have to dig out an awful lot right on top of it looking out at the Bay. coming and going out of the system. http://waterdata.usgs.gov/ca/nwis/ “There are other pools of money, but “It helped us understand that Frank’s back in 1988 to expand it, to get ade- of fill. JE The team couldn’t resist sending the quate habitat types. We were inspired continued to back page