The Peace River Manasota Regional Water Supply Authority (Peace River Authority), a Florida utility that provides drinking water to a region of nearly 1 million people across Charlotte, DeSoto, Manatee, and Sarasota counties, recently updated its Strategic Plan to include its involvement with the Florida Water & Climate Alliance (FloridaWCA). Having partnered with the FloridaWCA for 10 years, Peace River Authority has recognized the importance of the collaboration and included its continued engagement with the FloridaWCA as an initiative in its Leadership & Water Advocacy Objective in their 2020 Strategic Plan.
Over their 10-year partnership, FloridaWCA and Peace River Authority have shared the latest information on climate and water related research and management, given workshops and webinars, co-produced climate science and applied it to Peace River Authority water supply operations. As part of a NOAA-funded project, Peace River Authority engineers and FloridaWCA scientists co-developed the Aquifer Storage and Recovery (ASR) Initiation Index, a decision support tool that incorporates downscaled climate projections and other variables to optimize when to withdraw stored surface water from the aquifer. Improving ASR operations decision making can both decrease utility operational costs and improve the quality of the water supply before treatment. In an ongoing project funded by NASA, Peace River Authority is partnering with FloridaWCA to seek further opportunities to integrate seasonal climate forecasts into the framework of water supply operations and management decision making.
