| Title: | Enabling the use of earth observation data for integrated water resource management in Africa with the water observation and information system |
| Authors: | Guzinski, R., S. Kass, S. Huber, P. Bauer-Gottwein, I.H. Jensen, V. Naeimi, M. Doubkova, A. Walli and C. Tottrup |
| Year: | 2014 |
| Journal: | Remote Sensing |
| Volume (Issue): | 6(8) |
| Pages: | 7819-7839 |
| Article ID: | |
| DOI: | 10.3390/rs6087819 |
| URL (non-DOI journals): | |
| Model: | SWAT |
| Broad Application Category: | conceptual approach |
| Primary Application Category: | GIS interface, GIS utility, or other type of interface/utility |
| Secondary Application Category: | none |
| Watershed Description: | Nile, Zambozi, and Volta Rivers, Lake Chad drainage area, located in Africa, and the entire continent of Africa. |
| Calibration Summary: | |
| Validation Summary: | |
| General Comments: | |
| Abstract: | The Water Observation and Information System (WOIS) is an open source
software tool for monitoring, assessing and inventorying water resources in a cost-effective
manner using Earth Observation (EO) data. The WOIS has been developed by, among
others, the authors of this paper under the TIGER-NET project, which is a major
component of the TIGER initiative of the European Space Agency (ESA) and whose main
goal is to support the African Earth Observation Capacity for Water Resource Monitoring.
TIGER-NET aims to support the satellite-based assessment and monitoring of water
resources from watershed to cross-border basin levels through the provision of a free and
powerful software package, with associated capacity building, to African authorities. More
than 28 EO data processing solutions for water resource management tasks have been
developed, in correspondence with the requirements of the participating key African water
authorities, and demonstrated with dedicated case studies utilizing the software in
operational scenarios. They cover a wide range of themes and information products,
including basin-wide characterization of land and water resources, lake water quality
monitoring, hydrological modeling and flood forecasting and mapping. For each
monitoring task, step-by-step workflows were developed, which can either be adjusted by
the user or largely automatized to feed into existing data streams and reporting schemes.
The WOIS enables African water authorities to fully exploit the increasing EO capacity
offered by current and upcoming generations of satellites, including the Sentinel missions. |
| Language: | English |
| Keywords: | water resource management; information systems; Earth observation; Africa |