Ephemeral Tributary Sediment Transport Measurement

The summary for the Ephemeral Tributary Sediment Transport Measurement 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 Bureau of Reclamation, which is the U.S. government agency offering this grant.

Ephemeral Tributary Sediment Transport Measurement: The purpose of this project will be to collect surrogate measurements coincident with definitive (physical) measurement of sediment flux in an ephemeral channel that will help establish a relationship between surrogate data and sediment flux. The research will make a determination of what surrogate measurements need to be collected in order to develop a relationship between surrogate data and definitive sediment flux.

The larger context of this research project reflects the fact that ungagged ephemeral tributaries present a challenging situation for estimating sediment delivery during a storm event. If a relationship between surrogate data and definitive sediment flux can indeed be developed, then practitioners may have a means to estimate bed load using relatively inexpensive surrogate data collection techniques. The current research site is the Arroyo de los Piños, which is on the western side of the Rio Grande, across the river from Socorro, NM.

This NOI is a modification of an existing agreement with New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. The modification includes additional funding for equipment necessary for the project. The equipment to be purchased includes electronic data acquisition components including: pipe hydrophones (to measure a surrogate of bedload), pressure sensors (to measure the rate of sediment entering bedload traps as well as hydrostatic pressure), a rain gage, a suspended sediment sampler, turbidity meters, along with necessary data loggers, connectors, software, converters, Modbus modules, relay boxes, and distributor boxes.