Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, South Florida/Caribbean CESU

The summary for the Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, South Florida/Caribbean CESU grant is detailed below. This summary states who is eligible for the grant, how much grant money will be awarded, current and past deadlines, Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) numbers, and a sampling of similar government grants. Verify the accuracy of the data FederalGrants.com provides by visiting the webpage noted in the Link to Full Announcement section or by contacting the appropriate person listed as the Grant Announcement Contact. If any section is incomplete, please visit the website for the Geological Survey, which is the U.S. government agency offering this grant.

Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, South Florida/Caribbean CESU: The U.S. Geological Surveys (USGS) Florida Integrated Science Center (FISC) in Ft. Lauderdale conducts ecological and hydrological research and monitoring in support of the Everglades Restoration project throughout South Florida, in conjunction with its Federal, State, and local partners. Information advances understanding of the south Florida ecosystem, which contributes to decision-making during the restoration effort. The Fort Lauderdale office of the USGS-FISC is offering a cooperative-agreement opportunity to universities with the capability to develop code and models related to hydrologic issues, such as ground-water and surface water interactions, wetlands, overland flows, saltwater intrusion, tidal functions, and hydro-periods. Hydrologists at the office primarily conduct research in freshwater and estuarine habitats in national-park areas. Current research interests include (but are not limited to) code and model development in Everglades and Biscayne National Parks to simulate hydrologic conditions, flow and salinity transport in the surface water and ground-water systems, and wetlands restoration effects to the natural system. The main objectives of this agreement are designed to answer questions critical to restoration success. There are four tasks that are contained within the current cooperative program: Objective 1 - This objective requires cooperation in updating the current USGS modeling code, FTLOADDS, to a more user friendly and portable code, which can be easily applied to many different areas. The objective requires knowledge of the current modeling code, South Florida hydrological processes and their numerical representation, and advanced model coding skills. Objective 2 - The second objective will link an existing model of the Everglades, the TIME model, with a newly developed model of Biscayne Bay, utilizing the updated version of FTLOADDS to create a comprehensive model that can properly simulate hydrologic restoration effects in the larger interconnected region. This objective requires knowledge of both the TIME model and the Biscayne Bay model, South Florida hydrological processes, computer skills, data handling and mining, and coding skills. Objective 3 - The third objective will link the new combined model with the SFWMDs Natural Systems Model (NSM) and the South Florida Water Management Model (SFWMM) to predict flow and salinity patterns in Biscayne and Everglades National parks for past and future conditions. This objective requires knowledge of the TIME model and the Biscayne Bay model, NSM, SFWMM, computer skills, data handling, mining, and analysis, and coding skills. Results from the various simulations will be used by managers to assess effects of some of the proposed CERP restoration scenarios. Objective 4 - The fourth objective will be to document the models and linkages in an USGS report or journal article format. This objective requires technical knowledge of the model code and the hydrological processes represented therein, data analysis, and report writing. Specific objectives for each task are as follows: Objective 1: Update FTLOADDS modeling code to latest version of SEAWAT. One of the major functions of FTLOADDS is to handle the hydrologic coupling between the surface water SWIFT2D code and the ground water SEAWAT code. Another important function is to provide for the data transfer between the models to support their interaction. The replacement of the presently used version with the latest version of the SEAWAT code will be done by migrating existing interfacing code, for example, to calculate the leakage across the land surface and by adding new code to take advantage of the enhanced capabilities contained in the latest version of SEAWAT. Test cases will be run to assure the updated code is operational and reliable. Objective 2: Join the newly developed FTLOADDS model of Biscayne Bay to the existing FTLOADDS TIME model. This task will merge the two model discretizations and eliminate all interior boundaries, such as along the C-111 and L-31 Canals. Algorithms to predictively simulate the leakage to and from the canals will be added based on simulated stages or the canal leakage predicted by the SFWMM. The TIME model presently uses 10 vertical layers and will have to be modified to conform to the 20 layers used in the Biscayne Bay model. Extensive testing of the full model will be carried out and additional calibration will take place against observations of stages, flows, and salinities. Finally, the new model performance will be evaluated by comparing results to those obtained with the separate submodels. Objective 3: Link models to the SFWMM model and run CERP scenarios for present and future conditions. The data for the boundaries of the FTLOADDS model will be acquired from the SFWMM model for the simulation period of 1990-2000. This period was chosen with the TIME application to represent a series of consecutive years of varied hydrologic conditions useful for ecosystem and biological performance measure evaluation in ENP. Since most of the input data have already been assembled for this period, it is more cost efficient to run Biscayne Bay and the full ENP/BNP model simulations for the same period. Link models to the NSM and run predevelopment conditions. In order to perform this task several modifications will have to be made to the models. Land use and land surface elevations will have to be modified to correspond to predevelopment conditions. Also, all the man-made features in the model, such as roads and canals, will have to be removed. Objective 4: Document results of modeling efforts in either a USGS Scientific Investigations Report or a journal article.