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Geographic Information Systems (GIS) represent a combination of hardware, software and data, which allows for the capture, management, analysis, and display of geospatial (geographically referenced) information. In a GIS, layers of spatially explicit data are linked to tabular (attribute) data in relational databases, allowing the user to analyze and visualize patterns and trends.

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Airborne LIDAR Technology for Sustainable Watershed Management: Ecological Health of Riparian Zones

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Airborne LIDAR measurements principally lead to the highly accurate 3D reconstruction of the landscape and its features. By mounting LIDAR measurement units on an aircraft large areas can be measured relatively quickly and cost effectively. Airborne LIDAR measurements can then be used to reconstruct a bare earth landscape as well as featured landscape which includes vegetation, buildings and other. These landscape reconstructions can then be used for a number of applications such as archeology, water and coastline management, farming, forestry, geology and conservation.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

Michez et al. (2013) examine the application of LIDAR data to monitor the ecological riparian zones, which are of concern in most parts of Europe due to the European Water Framework Directive. As a transition zone between dry and wet environments riparian areas are typically high in ecosystem productivity and biodiversity. The authors use LIDAR point cloud data to derive a Digital Terrain Model (DTM) and canopy height model which allows for establishing general riparian zone attributes and ecological integrity.

Airborne LIDAR Technology for Sustainable Watershed Management: Red River Basin

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Airborne LIDAR measurements principally lead to the highly accurate 3D reconstruction of the landscape and its features. By mounting LIDAR measurement units on an aircraft large areas can be measured relatively quickly and cost effectively. Airborne LIDAR measurements can then be used to reconstruct a bare earth landscape as well as featured landscape which includes vegetation, buildings and other. These landscape reconstructions can then be used for a number of applications such as archeology, water and coastline management, farming, forestry, geology and conservation.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

Southern Manitoba has a long history of flooding events which has led to significant damages in the region over the years. The Red River Valley (RRV) is a disaster hot spot in the United States and a multi-million dollar floodway was built to protect the City of Winnipeg from floodwaters in Canada (see Figure 1). The spring melt of 2011 brought with it simultaneous flooding events in most of Southern Manitoba (Public Safety Canada 2013). The Assiniboine and Souris River Basins which typically do not have excess floodwaters were also gravely affected in 2011.

ArcSWAT Application in Basin-Scale Water Security Assessments: Azov Sea Case Study

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

The current study investigates the change of water supply in the Azov Basin, in particular in the Tsimlyansk reservoir under different land use and climate change scenarios by 2050.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

Spatially-explicit scenarios of climate and land cover changes using datasets of the EnviroGRIDs project were used for assessing water security threats using the SWAT model.

Scenarios were built based on outputs of the Metronamica model, which allows assessing spatial development in the land use depending on external factors and policy measures (RIKS 2005).  The scenarios were based on the storylines proposed by IPCC-SRES (Nakicenovic et al. 2000) corresponding to the different ways of global socio-economic development.

Citizen-led Mapping of Urban Metabolism in Cairo

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Traffic congestion by the nearly 5 million cars on its roads, coupled with unregistered smelters and other industries, has resulted in Cairo having one of the highest pollution rates of any city second only to Delhi. This will further exacerbate the effects of global climate change, the results of which are projected to include sea level rise into Egypt’s fertile Delta region and freshwater resources growing increasingly scarce from desertification.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

The Project involves El Balad mobilizing citizens through its existing networks and students at Cairo University being trained on adapting and applying public participation techniques, GIS and UMIS, by academic faculty and the EWMP Partnership.

Effective Communication of Flood Risk Information for Improved Decision Making in Rakhine State, Myanmar

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Rakhine State receives stormy weather from the Bay of Bengal in the monsoon seasons, resulting in heavy precipitation between May and October each year. Flooding is a common threat for Rakhine. Mountains on the western part of the state often contribute to occurrences of flash floods while extreme flows from several rivers in the state caused riverine flooding almost annually. One of the worst floods in the State’s recorded history took place in July and August 2015 during the aftermath of Cyclone Komen, which also triggered devastating landslides throughout the country.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

In Rakhine State, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), with technical partnership of the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC) and the Myanmar Engineering Society (MES), initiated an activity in 2011 to assess and map the risk from possible disasters in Rakhine State including flood, earthquake, tsunami, cyclone, storm surge, landslide and forest fire. While the other types of hazards are impactful for the state, this study focuses on floods.

Environmental Management Plan for the Lake Uromiyeh Ecosystem, Iran

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Lake Uromiyeh is shallow (6-8 m deep) and has no outflow, so all the precipitation falling in the basin evaporates either from the land or from the lake itself. The evaporating water leaves the dissolved salts behind. The actual salinity depends on the amount of water in the lake, i.e. the lake level. These circumstances led to the development of a relatively simple ecology, populated by salt-loving organisms at each level of the food chain.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

The principles of integrated water management were applied. The key tool in it was a decision support system (DSS) that combined data from all related fields.

The advantage of using a DSS in integrated water resources management is that it provides the possibility of testing outcomes of different water allocation schemes, i.e. of different scenarios.

The DSS for Lake Uromiyeh incorporated several software tools, comprising four major logical units (Figure 2).

GIS Based Communication Platform for the Sustainable Management of Transboundary Water Resources in Lithuania, Poland, Belarus and Kaliningrad Region (Russia)

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

Pregolya and the Neman rivers are heavily affected by anthropogenic pressures in all four countries. The lack of basin wide information on pressures and current ecological and chemical status of water bodies is an important issue for the sustainable management in the region. Due to the political situation in the region the sustainable transboundary management of river basins was limited. So far the planning of water resources was usually based only on national data.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

A GIS database consisting of 12 transboundary GIS layers (Table 1) and more than 100 attribute fields was created. The database content is based on national information. The information for different countries was obtained from various sources: official GIS maps, official statistical data, digitized paper maps, reports, literature, etc. The long list of sources meant that the detail level of the map was diverse. The data harmonization was necessary to provide the unified basin wide information layers.

GIS Based Tool for the Landscape Retention Planning

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

The proposed analysis was relevant to mitigation of droughts and floods. The other aim was to preserve the biodiversity of habitats that are strongly related to water resources, including habitats and species of a great natural value. Measures categorised as small retention aims to cause a slowdown of surface water runoff, rainwater outflow, and subsurface flow. While planning for undertaking such measures, measures aiming at retention of water within the catchment by increasing soil retention, use of aquatic ecosystems, old meanders and ponds should be prioritised.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

The valorisation procedure was done (Figure 1) in following steps:

Modeling and Visualization of Water Use in an Arid Region: Case Study from El Paso, Texas-Ciudad Juarez, Mexico

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

This case study took place in the Rio Grande valley which is the fastest growing region in the United States. Water in the southwest can act as a break on the economic development of this region.

ICT Application / Outcome: 

The model was structured into three main sections of hierarchical blocks: population, water demand and water supply (Figure 2).  From these sections, the Hueco Bolson storage level was determined.  Three plotters were then used to plot demand, population and Hueco Bolson Storage levels.

Remote Sensing Based Agricultural Drought Monitoring and Yield Loss Prediction Method

Problem Description / Relevance to Water Security: 

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and Global Water Partnership (GWP) have launched a joint Integrated Drought Management Programme (IDMP) in March 2013, to improve monitoring and prevention of one of the world’s greatest natural hazards. GWP is responding to the climate change challenge through a portfolio of programmes and projects aimed at building climate resilience through better water management (Kindler and Thalmeinerova 2012).

ICT Application / Outcome: 

The case study has three important steps, which correspond and relate to each other in hierarchical way.