Project description: Reporting of evapotranspiration (ET) from irrigated agriculture in the western U.S. is increasingly being required for surface and groundwater-use inventories, estimating historical pumpage, as well as supporting water rights, transfers, and management. Crop conditions vary significantly in time and space due to crop phenology, management, stress and fallowing. Satellite imagery with sufficient spatial resolution can be used to observe crop conditions and estimate ET. The objective of this project is to develop an open-source cloud computing software framework, OpenET, that allows water agencies to operationally produce and analyze satellite-based ET data for day-to-day operations. OpenET also assists special studies with the aim of improving water management through enhanced knowledge of historical and current consumptive use and hydrologic budgets.
End users/partners: Nine western state water resource agencies: Nevada Division of Water Resources, Utah Division of Water Resources, Wyoming State Engineer's Office, Montana Department of Natural Resources, Texas Water Development Board, California Department of Water Resources, California Water Control Board, Idaho Department of Water Resources and Oregon Water Resource Department
Data sources, models, technology: Landsat, Sentinel-2, METRIC and SIMS, Google Earth Engine, web visualization and data dissemination, open-source code repository