Review of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection Operations Support Tool for Water Supply (2018) / Chapter Skim
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6 Enhancements and Future Uses of OST
6 Enhancements and Future Uses of OST
Pages 159-166
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From page 159... ...
. As discussed in Chapter 2, OST is now used to enhance water supply and water quality reliability and to gain insights on how water supply operations may affect downstream fish habitat and stream ecosystems.
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From page 160... ...
In addition, applications of the tool and the outcomes of those applications can provide valuable information for informing subsequent operational assumptions and would benefit current and future systems operators. By enabling retrieval of prior runs of OST and "reverse engineering" those runs, current and future operators would gain insights into how and why the system responded under, for example, varying streamflow and turbidity forcing conditions, management of extreme rainfall events, reservoir release strategies under persistent drought, and work-arounds to cope with major system shutdowns.
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From page 161... ...
With both model improvement and training as objectives, this type of analysis could be fed back into OST's model structure and code, at the same time offering NYC DEP's staff valuable practice for handling "off normal" conditions. Lessons learned from previous experience could be incorporated into "play books" in which specific operational scenarios are documented in a form that could guide NYC DEP staff on future operational decisions.
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From page 162... ...
USE OF OST TO SUPPORT COMPLIANCE WITH THE FILTRATION AVOIDANCE DETERMINATION A defining feature of OST is its interface between the OASIS model and the W2 water quality module, which enables the simulated interaction between reservoir operations and water quality throughout the system.
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From page 163... ...
The expansion of OST's scope in simulating other water quality metrics could enable its use beyond system operations to include analysis of potential impacts of modifying current practices or implementing new actions under the authority of the Watershed Protection Program. The Watershed Protection Program currently includes a wide range of land-use restrictions and other watershed practices to reduce the possibility that contaminants such as fecal coliforms, pathogens such as Cryptosporidium and Giardia, and precursors of disinfection byproducts will enter the water supply.
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From page 164... ...
OST serves as a repository of current understanding of the dynamics within the water supply system, but can also serve to highlight research questions that could improve its usefulness to NYC DEP. One example relates to structuring physical experiments to measure sediment fate and transport within the Catskill system to provide an improved understanding of how turbidity correlates with precipitation events of varying antecedent conditions, duration, and intensity.
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From page 165... ...
To this end, the Committee encourages NYC DEP and its academic partners to consider structuring a more formal research program and to take steps to improve documentation and timely publication of results in the peerreviewed literature. COMMUNICATION ABOUT OST AND HOW IT IS USED Given the complexity of OST and the many assumptions built into its code, NYC DEP is challenged to provide the public with a clear and compelling explanation of OST's workings, and how it is used to inform decision making in accordance with NYC DEP's mission of providing drinking water to New York City.
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From page 166... ...
2010. New York City's Operations Support Tool (OST)
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