Reclamation Information Sharing Environment (RISE)

Repeat sedimentation surveys are a valuable tool for water managers and are part of sediment management plans, which are required by FAC02-01. Efficient data collection and processing will save the government time and money. This research quantifies 9 levels of data processing in terms of percent difference to a final dataset as well as the time it takes to complete the various processing levels. Data from two reservoirs are included in this research: Lake Minatare (Nebraska) and Pueblo Reservoir (Colorado). These reservoirs represent a range of reservoirs in terms of size. This research demonstrates that capacity (storage volume) values to within a few percent of the final values can be achieved within a few hours of data processing. A surface intended to represent the bed of a reservoir should be clean and free of outliers, both because the data are often used for other applications, such as numerical modeling, and because obvious errors/outliers reduce confidence in the final product. This research does demonstrate similar results for both larger and smaller reservoirs. Future efforts to improve efficiencies can be explored with smaller reservoirs with a reasonable expectation that the methods will also provide efficiencies for larger reservoirs. To see the surface data associated with Lake Minatare, please see https://data.usbr.gov/catalog/8531/item/133940. To see the surface data associated with Pueblo Reservoir, please see https://data.usbr.gov/catalog/4596/item/133939.