2013 Cache La Poudre River Projects

Flood Effects on Oil & Gas Wells

Project Website - Danling Hu, Zach Wurtzebach

As a result of record-setting flooding along the Front Range in October of 2013, spills and contamination were documented at several facilities, and public concern led to legislative hearings aimed at assessing the threat of contamination to surface water. In addition, hydraulic fracturing—the pressurized injection of high volumes of sand, water, and various chemicals to extract natural gas—has been cited as a threat to groundwater resources. Fears of contamination, prompted by documentaries such as Gasland and reports of contaminated water, have recently helped to garner support for regulatory policy change at the state level, as well as voter approved bans and moratoriums within the Front Range municipalities of Boulder, Longmont, and mostly recently, Lafayette and Fort Collins. 
In recognition of the public interest, this project examines the spatial relationship of oil and gas development to surface and sub-surface water resources within the Cache La Poudre watershed. Our inquiry focuses on the following questions.

Water Quality & Land Use

Project Website - Karie Boone, Erika Szonntag

This GIS research project compares land use types, water management entities, and water quality for the CLP watershed. We provide a comprehensive illustration of water quality, local-level decision-making, and land use across the watershed. We were interested in including a specific focus on social aspects of water on the CLP. Researchers and resource managers alike recognize the need to manage resources at a landscape scale and include human institutions in analysis of ecological systems (Chapin 2009). We aimed to use geospatial analysis to locate the intersection of social and ecological variables. This has been done for Agricultural water governance on the Colorado River Basin to analyze the intersection of “Ag, hydrological, and human systems where formal and informal policies, rules, and practices shape interaction with the environment” (Sternlieb and Laituri 2012:8). For this project we compare water quality, land use and water management entities in the CLP. Water management entities are local, state-mandated administrative units. In the CLP watershed, the categories include water districts, conservancy districts, and water sanitation districts. By highlighting specific managing entities we are able to focus on the potential impacts of decision-making on water quality.

Flood Risk Zones

Project Website - Kevin Gaalaas, Chip Belcher, Manijeh Mahmoudzadeh Varzi

In September of 2013 a slow-moving cold front converged with moist air over the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains in the Colorado Front Range. The stalled weather system brought flooding that impacted 17 counties and amounted to 17 inches of rain in the worst hit areas over a five-day period (CNN). By the end of the storms, Govenor John Hickenlooper had declared a state of emergency for 14 counties (9News). While such an event brings catastrophic damage to property, infrastructure and human life, the flood presents an opportunity for communities and planners to learn and prepare for future flood events.

Modern technologies including remote sensing and GIS are powerful tools for the identification of flood risk zones. Using these tools in analyzing the 2013 Colorado floods provides a chance to shed new light on factors affecting flood risk. In this study we use satellite-derived data of the 2013 flood to locate flooded areas within FEMA flood risk zones for the Cities of Fort Collins and Loveland. By assessing commonalities and differences in land type between the two cities reveals real conditions that should be considered in future land development, allocation of relief resources and insurance analyses.

Land Cover and Land Use Change from 1992-2006

Project Website - Mark Peterson and Paige Shilling

For our project, we investigated land cover and subsequent land use change in the Cache la Poudre (CLP) watershed within Larimer County from 1992-2006. We were interested in determining percent land cover for agriculture, barren, developed, forest, grassland/shrub, water, and wetlands. In addition, we were interested in determining percent change of each land cover type for 1992-2001, 2001-2006, and 1992-2006.

We conducted our analysis using satellite imagery from the unsupervised classification of Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper+ data. The Multi-Resolution Land Characterization Consortium compiles the Landsat data and produces the National Land Cover Database. We conducted an analysis of the land cover data from 1992, 2001, and 2006 to quantify land cover change and subsequent land use change in the CLP watershed within Larimer County.

Wildfire Occurrence and Potential Erosion

Project Website - Andrew Spencer and Emma Vakili

We decided to analyze the occurrence of wildfires in the Poudre River watershed during the ten-year period from 2003 to 2012. Very little spatial data was found describing the burned area perimeters for small fires, which are by far the majority of incidents. To address this, we took the available point data from the US Geological Survey and created buffers of each point that represents the total acres burned for all fires under 1,000 acres in size, resulting in circles that approximate the actual size of each of these small fires (though not necessarily the exact shape). Perimeters were available for all fires over 1,000 total acres in the study area, and these files were used in the final maps.

We used a variety of scholarly journal articles about fire effects in Colorado to establish the parameters for our analysis, eventually settling on slope, aspect and proximity to water to establish zones of highest risk for post-fire erosion and fire severity over the 12 year period, but based on our research we found that northern aspects with a slope of over 30% posed the highest risk for severe fires and post fire erosion. Northern aspects, in general, have the highest fuel loadings that result in the highest levels of soil impact following a fire.

Oil and Gas Development Over Time

Project Website - Kathleen Masterson and Erin McGowan

How do we heat our homes? What enables us to drive our cars? Oil & gas industry, which sometimes has a stigma, provides millions of people with means to get through our daily lives. Even in Northern Colorado, there has been an increase in drilling since technology has advanced and shale plays can be more efficiently assessed and operations as productive as ever. Given the new pull towards unconventional well drilling in the US with this advancing technology, we would expect to see an increased density of horizontal wells around the Poudre River specifically in the Wattenberg field. Through the time series analysis, we will take a look at the drilling operations in the Cache la Poudre watershed and the development that has progressed from the late 60’s to today. Time-Series analysis was chosen since it has been proven to be effective for broad audiences (IEEExplore, 2011).

High Park Fire Erosion

Project Website - Ashton Dilka and Jessica Teets

The Cache la Poudre watershed is a unique environment in that its characteristics make it prone to fire and erosion. Varying vegetation types and recreational activities, such as camping, make it prone to fires. Its varying slopes and vegetation cover, as well as certain soil types can encourage erosion. Fire and erosion are linked because one can lead to another. Areas that have recently experienced fires are more susceptible to erosion than areas that have not. Identifying areas that are at a high risk for one or a combination of these events can lead to concentrated management. If managed correctly, the damage that may occur in these areas may be significantly reduced. Finally, being aware of the location of high risk areas allows those sites to be secured and managed first after a combination of these events occurs to ensure a speedy recovery and erosion prevention.

A combination of a model and GIS were used to create maps showing layers including burn severity, erodibility index, and post-fire sediment yield. In addition to identifying areas of risk for fire and soil erosion in the Cache la Poudre watershed, we will examine the extent of the High Park Fire within the watershed as a comparison for our assessment. We will also be able to identify areas at highest risk for erosion within the High Park Fire boundary that may be useful for management purposes.

How Irrigation Ditches Shaped Urban Growth

Project Website - DeAnna Laurel, Reanna Putnam

The debate of who owns the water began early in Colorado history and the Cache la Poudre played a unique role. There was a great deal of conflict around water usage between the early settlements of Fort Collins and Greeley. This conflict shaped the way in which irrigation ditches were dug and used throughout the latter half of the 19th and early 20th century. There are vestiges of these early debates present in our contemporary relationship to the Cache la Poudre River, evident in the Save the Poudre campaign, which seeks to prevent the construction of a large reservoir that would divert 35% of the water in the section of the Poudre that runs through Fort Collins (Project Impacts). Our project seeks to trace the historic roots of heated debates such as this through spatial analysis of historical change in the Cache la Poudre basin.

Riparian Zones

Project Website - Eric Rounds, Amanda Shores, Marielys Velez

Although riparian habitats may sustain high levels of biodiversity, they are historically one of the most disturbed habitats. Understanding the factors that create maximum biodiversity is important for management (Nilsson, 2002). One of the main determining factors for maximum plant and animal biodiversity is the flow regime (Nilsson, 2002). Every river has characteristic flow patterns like magnitude, frequency, duration and timing of flooding. There can be reductions in naturally occurring carrying capacity when there are changes to flow regime (Nilsson, 2002). When a riparian habitat is managed by the City of Fort Collins or the state of Colorado, managers regulate flow regimes and protect endangered species or species of concern within the area, creating conditions for maximum diversity. This project explores riparian zones within the Growth Management Area of the City of Fort Collins.

Flood Impacts on Communities

Project Website - Aubrey Miller and Drew Derderian

We are interested in understanding the impacts of flooding to communities living along the Cache la Poudre River in Larimer and Weld Counties in northern Colorado. After the flooding events in northern Colorado in September of 2013, the lack of information on exactly which social demographics were impacted by flooding became apparent. This project investigates who is affected by flooding along the Cache la Poudre River in northern Colorado. Specifically, we want to understand to what extent do the demographic characteristics of those living in the Cache la Poudre River floodplain match the characteristics of the population of their respective county and the State of Colorado?

Rain and Stream Flow Gauge Database

Project Website - Leana Schwartz and Gabriel Sosa

The Cache la Poudre Watershed is located in northern Colorado and a small portion of southern Wyoming. The Watershed encompasses the Cache la Poudre River in addition to numerous tributaries that flow eastward from the headwaters in Rocky Mountain National Park. The Watershed drains an area of 4895 km2 of the Colorado Front Range and elevations range from 1400 meters to 3278 meters. The Cache la Poudre Watershed provides water resources for many regions of the Colorado Front Range, including the city of Fort Collins, and because of this, having a clear understanding of the water source is important in predicting future water patterns. The objectives of this project were to create a database of rain and stream flow gauge locations in the Cache la Poudre Watershed, analyze the distribution and elevation gradient in which each gauge is located and create an interactive map with location and descriptive properties of rain and water gauging locations.

Vegetation and Geology along an Elevational Gradient

Project Website - Sasha Victor, Adam Johnson

The Cache la Poudre watershed is a multi-use area that is intensively utilized by many stakeholder groups for a variety of purposes, including full- and part-time residents, agriculture/grazing, hikers, climbers, off road vehicle users, hunters, and many more. A strong understanding of the watershed allows stakeholders and managers to better appreciate and utilize it as a natural resource.

Our goal for this project was to create a set of maps that characterized the Cache la Poudre watershed by vegetation, geology, and elevation. We envision these maps and statistics being useful for both the casual watershed stakeholder, including students ranging in ages from elementary through secondary to collegiate, and as a resource for land managers and researchers. Using the ArcGIS Zonal Statistics tool, we use vegetation and geology classifications as zones and calculate mean elevation and slope. We also analyzed the intersection of vegetation and geology. Along with the descriptive statistics, we created a series of maps that visually show the distribution of each vegetation and geology type along an elevational gradient.

Kaloko-Honokohau National Historic Park, Hawaii

Project Website - Alyssa Hendricks

Kaloko-Honokohau National Historic Park (KAHO), on the western side of the Big Island of Hawai'i, was established in 1978 with a mission to protect traditional native Hawaiian activities and culture. This includes the preservation of numerous anchialine pools and fishponds. These inland, as well as marine, waters of KAHO provide vital habitat for six federally protected species and three candidates threatened or endangered species in addition to traditional Hawaiian aquaculture. KAHO sits at the base of the Hualalai Aquifer, an area with growing demand for water resources, largely due to increased development in the region.

Since the aquifer sits below the Hualalai Volcano, there is a steep elevation gradient, which induces a similar precipitation gradient, but with the greatest precipitation in the middle elevations. Changes in rainfall amounts have been observed at precipitation monitoring stations in recent decades, though the spatial extent and variability in these changes is unknown. This study aims to use GIS analysis techniques to evaluate spatial trends in precipitation over the region for a 30-year period.

 

 

Updated: August 29, 2009 © 2009 All Rights Reserved.
Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80522 USA