MyWater - Merging hydrological models and EO data for reliable information on water

The MyWater project focuses on water safety and security in rural and urban areas. Earth Observation is used for identifying land use and for real-time monitoring of the leaf area index, evaporation and soil moisture. This is combined with hydro-meteorological models for forecasting high intensity rainfall events and so on. These hydrologic cycle components are essential to optimise water management in conditions of limited or abundant water.

At the moment 2.5 billion people on our planet are without adequate access to water. At the same time millions suffer from frequent and devastating floods, with many casualties as a result. Climate change, population growth and urbanisation dramatically worsen the current situation. To be able to manage water resources well, water authorities need reliable information to adapt their strategic and operational policies to new situations.

Objective of the consortium

MyWater provides water information services of rural and urban areas with the objective of optimising water management using a combination of earth observation (EO) technologies, in-situ monitoring networks and hydrologic simulation models. In this project we develop together with SMEs and research institutes over Europe a new platform for exchange of water data, information and knowledge. Apart from data of monitoring networks the project uses information from EO satellites which are available through GMES. Variables of e.g. evaporation and soil moisture are determined using advanced algorithms, which can be applied operationally all over the world.
Apart from rural applications the project addresses the rural-urban interactions of excessive water, e.g. in flood simulations resulting from excessive rainfall.

The role of HydroLogic

In this project HydroLogic develops the open source PriceXD overland flow software, which runs in parallel with sewer models e.g. SWMM to simulate urban flooding in detail. Also basic meteorological information of rainfall of various sources is made available, ranging from world-wide satellite radar monitoring to C-band radar monitoring as well as forecasts of global and local hydro-meteorological models.

The MyWater platform and web-portal are developed by HydroLogic in cooperation with partner Hidromod from Portugal.

This project received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme under Grant Agreement No. 263188.