North American Weather Consultants, Inc. the CONDUCT AND
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North American Weather Consultants, Inc. THE CONDUCT AND EVALUATION OF A CLOUD SEEDING PROGRAM FOR SIX CREEKS PROGRAM DURING THE 2018-2019 WINTER SEASON Prepared for Salt Lake City Department of Public Utilities By Stephanie D. Beall David P. Yorty Don A. Griffith North American Weather Consultants, Inc. 8180 South Highland Dr., Suite B-2 Sandy, UT 84093 Report No. WM 19-10 Project No. 18-429 August 2019 TABLE OF CONTENTS Section Page 1.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................. 1-1 2.0 CLOUD SEEDING THEORY .......................................................................................... 2-1 3.0 PROJECT DESIGN ........................................................................................................... 3-1 3.1 Background .............................................................................................................. 3-1 3.2 Seedability Criteria .................................................................................................. 3-1 3.3 Equipment and Project Set-Up................................................................................. 3-2 4.0 METEOROLOGY AND MODEL DATA ........................................................................ 4-1 5.0 OPERATIONS ................................................................................................................... 5-1 5.1 Operational Procedures .......................................................................................... 5-11 5.2 Operational Summary ............................................................................................ 5-12 December 2018 ..................................................................................................... 5-12 January 2019 ......................................................................................................... 5-13 February 2019 ....................................................................................................... 5-14 March 2019 ........................................................................................................... 5-16 April 2019 ............................................................................................................. 5-18 6.0 ASSESEMENT OF SEEDING EFFECTS ........................................................................ 6-1 6.1 Background .............................................................................................................. 6-1 6.2 Evaluation Approach ............................................................................................... 6-3 6.3 Target and Control Data Resulting Equations ......................................................... 6-4 6.4 Results for the 2019 Water Year ............................................................................ 6-10 7.0 SUMMARY, HISTORICAL UTAH PROGRAMS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ......... 7-1 7.1 Summary .................................................................................................................. 7-1 7.2 Historical Information of other Utah Programs ....................................................... 7-3 7.3 Recommendations .................................................................................................... 7-6 References Appendices A MEDIA RELEASES B COMPUTER MODEL DESCRIPTIONS i TABLE OF CONTENTS (continued) Figure Page 1.1 Six Creeks Target Area ...................................................................................................... 1-2 3.1 Target Area and Seeding Site Locations ............................................................................ 3-3 3.2 White Reservoir Cloud Seeding Site ................................................................................. 3-5 4.1 Visible Satellite Image ....................................................................................................... 4-2 4.2 Base Reflectivity Image ..................................................................................................... 4-3 4.3 700 mb Map ....................................................................................................................... 4-4 4.4 HYSPLIT Plume Dispersion Forecast ............................................................................... 4-5 4.5 GFS Model Forecast February 21, 2019 ............................................................................ 4-6 4.6 Liquid Water Forecast: February 5, 2019 ......................................................................... 4-7 5.1 January 2019 Snow Water Equivalent Map....................................................................... 5-5 5.2 February 2019 Snow Water Equivalent Map..................................................................... 5-6 5.3 March 2019 Snow Water Equivalent Map......................................................................... 5-7 5.4 April 2019 Snow Water Equivalent Map........................................................................... 5-8 5.5 NRCS SNOTEL plot for Louis Meadows ......................................................................... 5-9 5.6 NRCS SNOTEL plot for Mill D – North ........................................................................... 5-9 5.7 NRCS SNOTEL plot for Snowbird ................................................................................. 5-10 5.8 Cottonwood Creeks Historical Snow Water Equivalent .................................................. 5-11 6.1 Six Creeks SNOTEL Target Site Locations ...................................................................... 6-6 6.2 Six Creeks SNOTEL Control Site Locations..................................................................... 6-7 7.1 Utah Percent of Median April 1, 2019 Snow Water Content ............................................ 7-2 7.2 Utah Winter Cloud Seeding Target Areas ......................................................................... 7-5 Table Page 3-1 NAWC Winter Cloud Seeding Criteria ............................................................................. 3-2 3-2 Seeding Site Locations ...................................................................................................... 3-4 5-1 Storm Dates and Generator Usage – 2019-2019 Winter Season ....................................... 5-1 5-2a Generator Hours for 2018-2019, Storms 1-12 ................................................................... 5-2 5-2b Generator Hours for 2018-2019, Storms 13-20 ................................................................. 5-3 5-3 Snowpack and Precipitation Data – April 8, 2019 ............................................................ 5-4 6-1 Target and Control SNOTEL Sites for Precipitation and Snowpack Evaluations ............ 6-8 6-2 Regression Equations ........................................................................................................ 6-9 6-3 Evaluation Results for the 2019 Water Year ................................................................... 6-11 7-1 Increased Runoff and Coast for the Utah Cloud Seeding Programs ................................. 7-4 ii 1.0 INTRODUCTION Salt Lake City sponsored earlier winter cloud seeding programs targeting the Six Creek’s drainage basins in water years 1989 through 1996. North American Weather Consultants (NAWC) operated these programs. NAWC analysis of potential effects of the seeding indicated positive effects (~6% to 17% for water years 1989 and 1990, Thompson, et al, 1990). It was NAWC understanding that this program was discontinued following water year 1996 due to budgetary considerations. The Salt Lake City Department of Public Utilities (SLCDPU) was contacted by the Utah Division of Water Resources regarding the cloud-seeding program. Following discussions, SLCDPU expressed an interest in re-establishing a cloud seeding program to impact the Six Creek’s drainage basins that provide runoff to the Salt Lake Valley. This interest was expressed in a letter to Candice Hasenyager, coordinator of the Utah Division of Water Resources cloud seeding programs, that would enable cost sharing of this program with the Utah Division of Water Resources (e.g., up to 50% cost sharing state support). NAWC contacted the SLCDPU and it was agreed that NAWC would prepare a proposal to conduct a program for the 2018-2019 winter season (NAWC proposal (# 18-429). The goal of the program would be to augment the flows of City Creek, Emigration Creek, Parleys Creek, Mill Creek, Big Cottonwood Creek and Little Cottonwood Creek. Figure 1.1 provides a map of the proposed target area (e.g., six creeks drainage areas above 6000 feet MSL). The SLCDPU accepted this proposal and an agreement was signed effective November 19, 2018. The program was operational from mid-December 2018 through April 18, 2019. The program was scheduled to run through April 30th, but seeding operations were terminated early due to high snow water contents in the target basins. The 2018-2019 winter season brought significant amounts of snow to all mountainous areas of Utah with a statewide average snow water content on April 1, 2019 of 140%. The remainder of this report will discuss the design, operation and evaluation of this program. Once the cloud seeding program was established, some public interest was generated in 1-1 the form of special television coverage on KSL, channel 5 and Fox channel 13 and a news feature in the Deseret News. For further information regarding media releases, please refer to Appendix A. Figure 1.1