PFI-TT: Gravity Satellite Observation System for Water Resource Management

这一创新-技术转化伙伴关系(PFI-TT)项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力旨在将一种新的卫星观测技术商业化，这将使美国和世界其他气候紧张地区的地下水资源得到更好的管理。该项目的重点是加利福尼亚州，因为该州的农业生产在2017年超过了500亿美元--是美国最大的。这项技术转换将使加州水利部和537个特殊水区的开支减少10%-20%，每年可净节省高达1000万美元，并对其经济发展产生积极影响。该团队将培养一批代表性不足的学生，使他们能够实现自己作为企业家的抱负，并用他们的创新发明丰富人们的生活。这项技术可能会开发一系列输出，以提供用户友好的当地信息，以便及时监测自然灾害，制定可持续计划，并保护美国和世界的脆弱地区和人口。该项目旨在利用市场需求，有效和高效地监测加利福尼亚州以及美国和世界其他气候压力地区日益稀缺的水资源。加州60%的供水来自地下水，地下水是主要的灌溉水源。不断加剧的极端天气加剧了因频繁干旱而过度抽水造成的水资源短缺。该项目的智力优势包括展示了一种新技术，其原型和商业化，使其能够使用NASA/GFZ的重力恢复和气候实验后续(GRACE-FO)重力测量卫星的数据，全天候和及时地量化加州的地下水储量。该团队将改善巨大的空间数据差距限制，并通过使用机器学习算法来提高时间分辨率，该算法使用一系列额外的数据集，以有效地缩小及时的地下水估计。这项技术可以通过缩小数据差距和有效遵守与水使用有关的法律来显著降低水管理和使用的费用。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation - Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project aims at the commercialization of a novel satellite observational technology, which would enable better management of groundwater resources in the United States and other climate-stressed regions in the world. The project focuses on the State of California as its agricultural productions exceeded $50 billion in 2017 - the largest in the United States. The technology translation would reduce the expenses of California’s Department of Water Resources and 537 Special Water Districts by 10–20%, which could net a savings of up to $10 million a year and positively impact its economic development. The team will train a underrepresented students, enabling them to realize their aspiration as entrepreneurs and enriching people’s lives with their innovative inventions. The technology is likely to develop a range of outputs to provide user-friendly local information for timely monitoring of natural hazards, formulating sustainable programs, and protecting vulnerable areas and populations in the United States and the world. The project seeks to capitalize on the market need to efficiently and efficiently monitor increasingly scarce water resources in the State of California and other climate-stressed regions in the United States and the world. Sixty percent of California’s water supply is from groundwater, which is the main irrigation source. Intensifying extreme weather exacerbates the scarcity of water due to excessive pumping due to frequent droughts. The intellectual merits of this project include the demonstration of a novel technology, its prototyping, and commercialization, to enable all-weather and timely quantification of groundwater storage in California using data from NASA’s/GFZ’s Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment Followon (GRACE-FO) gravimetry satellites. The team will ameliorate large spatial data gap limitations and improve temporal resolutions by employing machine learning-enabled algorithms using an ensemble of additional datasets to effectively downscale timely groundwater estimates. The technology may significantly reduce the expense of water management and usage by closing the data gap and enabling efficient compliance with laws pertaining to water usage.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.