Water Allocation in Lake Okeechobee during Periods of Shortage and Drought
Walter M. Wilcox,
Luis G. Cadavid,
Jayantha T. B. Obeysekera,
Lehar M. Brion, and
Paul J. Trimble
South Florida Water Management District, West Palm Beach, FL
As part of the overall Water Shortage Plan (South Florida Water Management
District 1991), the Supply Side Management (SSM) protocol was designed as a
guideline for implementing restrictions on the quantities of water supply
deliveries from Lake Okeechobee to the Lake Okeechobee Service Area (LOSA).
When Lake Okeechobee levels fall below the SSM Trigger Line (Figure 1), water
restrictions may be placed on users of Lake Okeechobee water.
Due to persistent low Lake Okeechobee levels by the end of 2000, water shortage
restrictions were initially declared on November 29, 2000 and remained in effect
until the suspension of restrictions on October 10, 2001. Figure 2 shows Lake
Okeechobee stages and LOSA allocation volumes, as calculated using the
procedure outlined in the 1991 SSM protocol, for the entire 2000-2001 SSM
implementation period. During the period of high dry season demand (October May), approximately 380,000 ac-ft were allocated to LOSA.
In the process of managing the 2000-2001 drought, a better understanding of the
system was realized and improvements to the current implementation of Supply
Side Management were made. These included: 1) real-time AFSIRS modeling
estimation of demand for the purposes of spatial distribution of allocation and
2) development of a methodology for implementing SSM during wet season
months based on use of the South Florida Water Management Model (SFWMM)
results. In addition, many additional improvements have been incorporated into a
draft Supply Side Management computational procedure and methodology which,
if adopted, could be used in future water shortages.
This presentation will review the SSM methodology as used in the 2000-2001
drought with emphasis on past and proposed modifications aimed at achieving
more effective drought and water shortage management for Lake Okeechobee.
Contact: Walter M. Wilcox, South Florida Water Management District, 3301
Gun Club Rd MS4340, West Palm Beach, Florida, 33406, Phone 561-682-2527,
Fax 561-682-5750, E-Mail: [email protected]
Figure 1:
Figure 2: