Dr. Alain Pietroniro
Environment & Climate Change Canada
Dr. Alain Pietroniro is a Research Scientist – Hydrologist with the National Hydrology Research Centre (Saskatoon, SK). He is Adjunct Professor in the Centre for Hydrology, University of Saskatchewan; Adjunct Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Waterloo and Associate Faculty, Department of Environmental Biology, University of Guelph. He graduated with distinction from the Agricultural Engineering Program at McGill University. He received Department Scholarships from the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Waterloo and holds a Citation of Excellence, Department of Environment. Dr. Pietroniro is Canadian Delegate to the WMO Commission on Hydrology; President of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences – Commission of Remote Sensing and a registered professional engineer in the Province of Saskatchewan. He is currently contributing to Environment Canada’s Hydrology Research Program with a major research focus on environmental remote sensing.
The SWOT-C Mission : A New vision for Water Futures in Canada
The origins of the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission dates back to 1978 with the launch of SEASAT with an objective to study the surface of Earth and measure the topography of the oceans. This mission was then followed in 1992 by the Topex-Poseidon satellite, then by Jason-1 (2001) and OSTM/Jason-2 (2008) a series of joint satellite mission between NASA and CNES with a mission to monitor global ocean circulation and ties between the ocean and the atmosphere. The proposed new SWOT mission will provide 120-km wide swath interferometric coverage with a 10-km wide gap at the nadir. The main sensor of the SWOT mission is the Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn) used to create high resolution, very accurate and precise instrument that will measure the height of the ocean’s surface with a posting every 2 km x 2 km, and a precision not to exceed 0.5 cm when averaged over the area. Inland, the sensor will be able to resolve 100-m wide rivers and 0.06-km2 (0.25 x 0.25 km) lakes, wetlands, or reservoirs water level elevations with an accuracy of 10 cm and a slope accuracy of 1 cm/km.
In 2010, NASA invited the Canadian Space Agency to contribute a set of Enhanced Interaction Klystrons (EIKs), a component needed for the KaRIn instrument of the spacecraft. In exchange for this contribution, the Canadian scientists can join the SWOT Science Definition Team (SDT) and contribute to pre- and post-launch calibration and validation (Cal/Val) experiments, to obtain a critical knowledge and experience of this technology. The Canadian segment of the mission is known as the “SWOT-C” project. The SWOT-C satellite mission will provide unique opportunities in the Canadian context for water managers in both the public domain and with the private sectors. Federal, provincial, territorial governments along with water resources practitioners in engineering consulting, mining, northern development, oil and gas, and general engineering practice will be able to take advantage of the unique dataset being provided by this satellite mission.
We know Canada is blessed with millions of rivers and lakes, however, it is impossible to monitor all of these and only a representative subset is currently monitored. Ungauged rivers and lakes make up the vast majority of hydrological features on the landscape. Moreover, for many undeveloped regions in Canada, is it virtually impossible to ascertain where future developments may occur, making it very difficult to ensure proper monitoring for development and environmental assessments. SWOT will allow us to map an important feature (elevation and slope) of these water bodies. These new data sources, although not as accurate as in-situ field measurements, will allow the water resource community to infer hydrological change in all ungauged regions that are detectable by SWOT. As such, the SWOT community sees two main areas of strong potential applications and ancillary objective related to other important areas of hydrological science: First, mapping elevation of storage features such as lakes and wetlands; Second, ungauged flow estimations and hydraulic data assimilation using change in elevation and local hydraulics models. As Canada gets ready for the mission launch proposed for 2021, important algorithm development, monitoring applications and new models will be developed. A synopsis of the plan will be presented.
KN-1 » Keynote (Dr. Alain Pietroniro) (08:40 - Tuesday, 19th June, Garry-Marquis)
