Pacific HYCOS Welcomes New Members to the Family

In December Pacific HYCOS project advertised position descriptions for three new positions that were to be added to the current Pacific HYCOS team. The interviews were conducted in February by the Pacific HYCOS Coordinator, Advisor, a team of senior SOPAC staff and Mr Suluimalo Amataga who represented the Pacific HYCOS Steering Committee upon nomination by the Committee Chair, Mr Ben Parakoti.

The three appointees to the new positions, are as follows

• Hydrologist – Mr David Turner
• Database/GIS Specialist – Mr Edwin Liava’a
• Project Officer –Mr Tukatara Tangi.

Mr David Turner hails from United Kingdom, working in New Zealand for the last four years. He brings with him 9 years of hydrological monitoring experience from UK and New Zealand which includes use of wide range of sensors, data loggers and telemetry units as a result of installing, maintaining and developing hydrological monitoring networks. He also has experience working with a number of data management tools including the NIWA TIDEDA database.

He will be responsible for assisting the PICs with the development of water resource monitoring and management systems. He will also be implementing activities in some of PICs where he will assist in installation of equipment and provide necessary training to the in country water resource management staff.

Mr Edwin Liava’a is the new Database and GIS Specialist for the Pacific HYCOS project and he will be implementing and maintaining the regional hydrological database which is one of the major components of the project. He comes from the Kingdom of Tonga and has a vast experience in the field of GIS and information technologies.

He will also be assisting and training water sector staffs in each country to design operate and maintain their national water resource databases. He will also assist in the management of the databases where required, manage the regional TIDEDA database hosted at SOPAC and develop a catchment based GIS for data presentation and asset management system.

The new Project officer Mr Tukatara Tangi is originally from Cook Islands and has been working for Community Risk Programme at SOPAC since 2004. He also has a 5 year experience in developing and maintaining water monitoring programme in Cook Islands. He, along with other project officers will be involved in providing technical assistance in the design and implementation of the monitoring networks, also organising and providing trainings to in country staff as need and facilitating administrative needs of the project. He is currently making great inroads to the development of the Pacific HYCOS website.

These posts were identified and included in the initial Pacific HYCOS proposal and with the project now in the implementation phase, the new members will increase the human resources available to the project. This team will ensure that the project delivers as proposed and is able to provide the PICs with an appropriate water resource monitoring and database management that would help the PICs to better manage their water resources.

Photo: (L-R) David Turner, Edwin Liava'a and Tukatara Tangi

Avana Stream, Rarotonga, Cook Islands, Installation April 2008

The Avana Catchment on Rarotonga is the largest on the Island supplying high quality water from an off-take on the Avana Stream, a significant portion of Rarotonga’s water supply. There are options in this catchment for increased rates of abstraction during higher flows or even the construction of a small dam and supply reservoir, supplying sustainable water in times of prolonged dry periods.

To better assess the catchments hydrology and sustainable yield in consideration of environmental flows etc, Pacific HYCOS funded the installation of a streamflow station to allow stream flows to be measured on a continuous basis.

The station was installed by the Department of Water Works staff under HYCOS supervision in April 2008 over a one week period. The type of system installed allowed for minimal in stream works and damages to install the sensor and gauge board, with the instrumentation located above maximum flood level. A program of streamflow measurements also commenced allowing for the streamflow discharge rating to be developed.

The data was unloaded from the data logger in mid May, showing a perfect hydrograph with some small flood events. With regular servicing, this station and the adjacent raingauge, will collect valuable hydrological data for use in design and planning of future water supply options for Rarotonga.

Staff capacity development is an ongoing part of such installations

Photo: Attaching gauge level boar, sensor on the right

Hydrological Data Rescue Reaches Samoa

In early March the HYCOS team made its way to Samoa once again, this time to initiate a data rescue programme for hydrological data stored within the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MNRE).

The data dated back to 1974 and consisted mostly of strip charts from a Stevens A71 Water Level Recorder. It was considered a priority to get this information into a digital database as the records would greatly help the Hydrology Department in Samoa to mitigate future floods and droughts.

To do this, HYCOS bought an A1 flatbed digitiser so that MNRE staff could digitise and extract records of flow patterns, and enter them into the database. Before arriving in Samoa, the digitiser was sent to NIWA to configure it for compatibility with the TIDEDA programme, which made it much easier for the MNRE staff to get the information straight from the chart into the TIDEDA database.

MNRE staff was provided with necessary training on how to use both the digitiser and TIDEDA as the main database. The enthusiasm of the staff to learn and a few trials lead to a good understanding of how to get the strip chart data into digital format.

MNRE staff were also advised to start assembling together site files that would have the records of all the infrastructure and equipment installed at the different sites which could be helpful when trying to analyse data. For example, if a site has both the water level recorder and a rain gauge, the analyst can easily compare the two records to see if the data correlates.

In addition the HYCOS team provided further training in the use of TIDEDA and hydro loggers for the benefit if the MNRE staff.

Photo: Project Coordinator Llyod Smith giving hands on training in the use of TIDEDA at the Vaipu site

Nauru Rainwater Harvesting Assets Surveyed

The Government of Nauru, through the Department of Lands & Survey, Department of Environment, and the Nauru Rehabilitation Corporation and Eigigu Holdings recently worked with SOPAC on a joint technical survey. The purpose of the survey was to map the rainwater harvesting infrastructure across the entire country.

High resolution, remotely sensed imagery from the Quickbird Satellite, global position systems (GPS) and geographical information systems (GIS) were used to provide an accurate spatial database of all private, communal and government properties. Capacity building and training in equipment were key activities of the Survey mission.

3 teams conducted the survey over a period of three weeks. To support local staff a 2-day introductory GIS/GPS training session was conducted which was then reinforced during the field survey with the use of the GeoXM GPS system. The actual field work involved assessing the condition of the rainwater harvesting associated infrastructure and assets such as roofing (capture), gutters (transmission) and tanks (storage) for each building.

Two methods of data collection, manual survey forms and direct entry into the GeoXM, GPS system were employed by each team as an extra precautionary measure against the risk of data loss. The contents of the form were transferred into a digital data dictionary using the Pathfinder Office software and uploaded into each GeoXM unit. Field data from the unit were then downloaded and exported in a format compatible with the MapInfo GIS software. The paper forms were checked against the data collected through the GeoXM and data editing and verifications were done where necessary. The main attributes of the data collected were exported and stored in an Access database.

At the conclusion of both surveys in 2007 and 2008 all buildings in the 14 districts of Nauru were surveyed. There are a total of 1334 rooftops with the potential to harvest rainwater. The outcome of the survey will allow the asset managers to identify the buildings in need of repair or replacement of rainwater harvesting infrastructure.

This work was undertaken in March 2008 as a joint Pacific HYCOS/EDF9 technical mission funded by the EU Reducing Vulnerability of Pacific (ACP) Countries project.

Photo: Local staff collecting GIS data during the survey

Pacific HYCOS Builds Capacity in Kiribati

Mr Matthew Cyr, a hydro-geologist graduate from Canada, is currently in Kiribati assisting and training the Mourongo Kataia’s Water Engineering Unit (WEU staff in data management, reviewing the current monitoring network and assisting with its rehabilitation and other Pacific HYCOS activities.

Matthew is no stranger to Kiribati, having lived and worked as a science teacher in north Tarawa for 2.5 years in 1998 during which time he learnt to speak I Kiribati. He returned to Tarawa in 2003, for 3 months undertaking groundwater assessment work for his Masters thesis and this time, he will assist the Pacific HYCOS project on a short term contract for 3 months, commenced April till July with the majority of his time spent providing hands on training to the WEU staff.

Given Matthew’s familiarity with I Kiribati culture and people we are hoping for some great progress and skills development at WEU where he works with Martin, Tertia, Mwaketa, and Moiua, assisting with basic Excel skills to improve the storage, analysis and presentation of basic water resource data, as well as undertaking a monitoring bore audit of which monitoring bores are still operational and what may be required to get the reminder operational and secured from vandalism.

There are four core activities that will be undertaken by Pacific HYCOS. These include

1. Rainfall gauges and Well Water Quality assessment in outer Islands – utilise water technicians to measure rainfall and undertake basic water quality measurements.
2. Capacity building of staff in water resource assessment and monitoring –linking with existing water program KAPII
3. Water Quality Testing in South Tarawa – develop awareness of level of contamination and type of contamination in underlying groundwater resource in South Tarawa, promote interagency approach.
4. Water Resource Monitoring – Bonriki – assist in the rehabilitation of existing bores and replacement of equipment if required.

Photo: Matthew Cyr, left, assisting WEU staff

Pacific HYCOS Develops Website

The HYCOS team has also been busy creating a website for the project. The website is still being completed and is not yet fully uploaded.

However we do have a prototype of the Pacific HYCOS website and it can be found at http://pigcos.soest.hawaii.edu/pihycos/joomla/ .

The website contains information about the project and the activities that are being run in each country. It will also have the project documents including the Country implementation plan and the MOU template which will be downloadable from the Website. It also has contact details of the Pacific HYCOS Team and the project steering Committee

At this point while we are still uploading more information we would request the Project Steering Committee to have a look at the Prototype and forward us any suggestions you may have regarding the content of the website.

The link of the website, once up and running, will be provided to WMO for their WHYCOS website and it will also be accessible at the SOPAC website.

For Website suggestion and queries contact Tukatara Tangi or Komal Raman, Project Officers for Pacific HYCOS.

Pacific HYCOS Second Steering committee meeting, Niue 18th – 25th July

Pacific HYCOS is taking the opportunity to interface with the IWRM meeting in Niue in July. Due to our mutual Water Resources interest, this will be a great boost to both programs. With Pacific HYCOS midway through its 3 year term, this opportunity will be utilised to review progress made to date, consider lessons learnt for better project delivery in the remaining 18 months.

Implementation is occurring in most of the countries with positive benefits being recognised already with increased capacity and data capture from remote stations. PIC’s are starting to take ownership of the project and their mutual comments, feedback and presentations will reinforce their support and commitment to this program collecting valuable baseline water resources data.

An agenda is yet to be fully developed but will be based on the following dot points. All Focal Points are encouraged to attend if possible and comment on the agenda and offer additional relevant items for discussion. The meeting will be attended by the WMO, EU, SOPAC and partner representatives.

Agenda items will include but not exclusively;

• Progress to date and issues
• Project implementation – MoU’s and CIP’s
• Procurement of equipment and services
• Country and regional Database (TIDEDA) and GIS development
• Data rescue activities
• Progress in Flood warning & drought analysis (extreme events)
• Sustainability issues and life beyond HYCOS
• On going training and capacity development
• A major case study presentation from Samoa who are currently implementing
• Pacific HYCOS linkages to IWRM
• Lessons learnt to date and mitigation measures

• Presentations from all PIC’s

Developing issues

There are some serious issues that have been identified on the scoping missions, particularly in the surface water PIC’s, which pertain to recurrent funding for sustainable field operations and access to robust, reliable 4WD vehicles and fuel. In some PIC’s, lack of these resources will compromise HYCOS implementation as field operations are only possible if at all, in a random irregular way.

Field programs such as those being set up by Pacific HYCOS require that regular servicing of river stations is undertaken for data unloads, essential servicing, O&M and undertaking discharge measurements, especially for low flows and floods. HYCOS is reluctant to supply instrumentation and equipment to PIC’s to see it sit on a shelf in a store room for a long period, or to see it installed with great effort from HYCOS, to see it fail some months later because it could not be serviced.

If such situations develop or are anticipated, we will need to consider deployment of such equipment to PIC’s that are better placed to implement. It is appreciated by all that soaring fuel prices and costs generally are seriously effecting field operations everywhere, especially where large distances are travelled, thereby compromising project sustainability.

These issues need robust discussion at the HYCOS meeting and how the NHS’s can mitigate their way through this, allowing for modest or expanding sustainable field operations to continue. Transportation is a serious issue already, regardless of fuel prices, HYCOS has been asked on many occasions if it can assist with vehicle purchases, and clearly we cannot. We can only suggest that representations are made to departmental heads, briefing them on HYCOS and the Actions (Themes) they have agreed to by signing the Pacific Regional Action Plan, Theme 1 Water Resources Assessment and Monitoring, Implementation Actions, Pacific HYCOS.

Access is essential to robust 4WD vehicles for accessing hydrological stations, in some cases; a servicing run can take 300 km and $200 of fuel!

Likewise, access to reliable boats, motors and fuel for undertaking discharge measurements, sediment sampling, cross section survey etc