Global Drought Monitoring Service through the GEOSS Architecture ...

Architectural Implementation Pilot, Phase 3 Version: 2.0
Global Drought Monitoring and European Drought
Observatory-Water SBA Engineering Report
Date: 11/Feb/2011
Table of Contents
A. Global Drought Monitoring Service and the Global Drought Community of Practice 8
1.1 Scope of this document 8
1.2 Importance of Global Drought Monitoring as a Critical Earth Concern and a
Prime Activity for GEO 9
1.3 Identification of Starting Conditions Fostering Drought is not Straightforward 9
1.3.1 Description of the Water Cycle 10
1.4 What are the User Requirements for an effective Drought Monitoring and
Forecasting Information System? 11
2. Drought Monitoring Components and Tools found in Hydrometeorology Drought
Monitoring Services within the Global Drought Community of Practice 13
2.1 European Drought Observatory 13
2.1.1 European Drought Observatory Portal Characteristics: “Drill Down” Capability 13
2.1.2 Importance of Soil Moisture for Monitoring Agricultural Drought 13
2.1.3 EDO-deployed Meteorological Drought Indicator: Standardized Precipitation
Index 15
2.1.4 Hydrologic Drought Indicator 15
2.2 USA National Integrated Drought Information System 16
2.3 Government of Canada Drought Coverage 18
2.4 Commonwealth of Australia Drought Monitoring 18
2.4.1 Commonwealth of Australia Water Availability Project 18
2.5 Africa Continental Drought Monitoring 19
2.5.1 Princeton Experimental African Drought Monitor 19
2.6 New Projects Permitting Further Development of the Global Drought
Monitoring Service 21
2.6.1 European Framework (EF) Drought Early Warning System for Africa--
DEWFORA 21
2.6.2 GLOWASIS (Global Water Scarcity Information Service) 21
2.6.3 Satellite Application Facility on Support to Operational Hydrology and Water
Management (H-SAF) 24
2.7 South American Continent 26
2.7.1 Republic of Argentina Servicio Meteorologic Nacional Drought Monitoring 26
3. Capturing User Requirements for the Global Drought Monitor and its
Interoperability with the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) 30
3.1 Assessment of Drought Vulnerability and Susceptibility 30
3.2 Capturing User Requirements and Implementation of Architecture to Design of
the Global Drought Monitor 31
3.2.1 Portal Requirements: Drill-down capability 31
3.2.2 Top-down versus bottom-up Design 31
3.2.3 Soil Moisture and Agricultural Drought Monitoring Requirement 32
3.2.4 Republication of information to help decision makers facilitate drought decision
Page 5