The impact of automated hydrometeorological instrumentation upon data quality for the Feather River basin, California

Automation of instrumentation for measuring precipitation and snow water equivalent has made it possible to monitor the Feather River Basin, California in real time, significantly improving flood forecasting performance. However, the technology which makes the data useful in real time may introduce serious problems for long-term data use. These problems include data gaps due to equipment failure, data errors due to loss of calibration or instrument errors, and loss of data quality due to instrumentation constraints. As a result, the data may be of limited usefulness and may require extensive processing before it can be incorporated into a long-term data base for water supply forecasting. These problems must be considered, and an adequate strategy of equipment and data base management must be developed in order to fully realize the potential benefits of automated hydrometeorological instrumentation.