DOI: 10.5061/dryad.x0k6djhn8
title: Data for: Water system simulation modeling with hydropower optimization and environmental flows: An example with Pywr

description: This dataset was used in the CenSierraPywr model created for the project
 "Optimizing Hydropower Operations While Sustaining Ecosystem
 Functions in a Changing Climate", for the California Energy
 Commission. Specifically, this data is to support reproducibility of the
 article describing the basic methods (Rheinheimer et al., in review). The
 model was built in Pywr, an open-source, linear programming-based Python
 package for modeling basin-scale water systems in the Central Sierra
 Nevada, California. Here, we focus on the Stanislaus and Upper San Joaquin
 River basins as they have high elevation hydropower typically operated to
 maximize revenue. CenSierraPywr consists of daily water allocations that
 include both hydroeconomic drivers for hydropower and more advanced
 environmental flows. Piecewise linear electricity prices from simulated
 hourly price data are used to drive discretionary hydropower, while
 environmental flows include the addition of ramping rates. Hydrological
 inputs include runoff data at the sub-basin level, based on the historical
 (1950 to 2011) daily gridded (1/16 degree) runoff data generated by the
 Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) hydrologic model developed by Livneh
 et al. (2013), forced with observed meteorological data and bias-corrected
 using local gauge data. All data inputs for reproducibility of
 CenSierraPywr for the Stanislaus and Upper San Joaquin Rivers are
 included, including original and preprocessed electricity and hydrological
 data and management-related data specific to certain hydropower projects
 or facilities.
description: Electricity prices Electricity prices were
 derived from a custom-developed dataset described at: https://doi.org/10.6071/M3295P Electricity prices were linearized using the pwlf Python package, using five (5) pieces. Hydrologic data Runoff data was based on the historical (1950 to 2011) daily gridded (1/16 degree) runoff data generated by the Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) hydrologic model developed by Livneh et al. (2013), forced with observed meteorological data and bias-corrected using local gauge data. Development of the historical data is further described at: https://doi.org/10.6071/M3609B Runoff was converted to relevant derivatives, such as aggregated runoff and water year types, using a variety of Python-based preprocessing scripts available from and further described at: https://github.com/vicelab/cen-sierra-pywr. Hydropower project-specific water year types were developed following the logic described in hydropower licenses issued by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).  Management data Management-related data (e.g., flood control curves, storage-elevation curves, urban and agricultural demands, hydropower project-specific water year type classifications), were derived from a variety of related publicly available data sources, FERC licenses, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Water Control Manuals, and observed data.
description: For use with CenSierraPywr, all data
 in the main data.zip file should be downloaded and extracted to the main
 data folder used for CenSierraPywr. This data folder should be specified
 in an environment variable called "SIERRA_DATA_PATH". The
 existing folder structure within the data.zip file should not be
 altered.