EAD1 - Open Data
The hydrology open data service is now live at Hydrology Data Explorer(External link) (HDE). We would welcome your feedback(External link) on the enhanced HDE service.
Project overview
Public access to the Environment Agency’s digital records from its hydrometric monitoring network is essential for the design of flood risk management projects, particularly to deliver the National Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Strategy.
The existing Hydrology Data Explorer, HDE, provides daily mean river flow data to inform water resource planners and abstractors, but this is no longer sufficient to meet the need for sub-daily (e.g., hourly) data for flood modelling.
This project will develop the HDE to make open station sub-daily data (river flow and level, rainfall, and groundwater) openly accessible via a web-based user interface and Application Programming Interface (API).
The project will enable flood risk management consultants to obtain both historic and current sub-daily data without the delay in having to make data requests. In addition, access to these data will support the ongoing research and development of methods for improved flood risk assessment by academia and industry.
Our project will:
- Give open access to daily and sub-daily station records for rainfall, river flow, river level, and groundwater across England.
- Enhance the existing open-access Hydrology Data Explorer web user interface and associated Application Programming Interface hosted on the Defra Digital Services Platform.
- Develop a workflow for the regular updating of near real time raw measurements from telemetry using exports of quality-checked data from the Environment Agency’s WISKI database.
- Produce a summary technical guide to the data export process steps.
How our project is improving flood hydrology
- The access to the sub-daily data will support the modelling required to deliver the National Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Investment Programme.
- The open access to the data will reduce the current cost and delay in meeting flood data requests by Environment Agency Hydrology and Telemetry staff.
- The access to the sub-daily data will support the application and continuous improvement of the methods for flood risk assessment.
How our project is contributing to the UK Flood Hydrology Roadmap
The UK Flood Hydrology Roadmap will be realised through 31 actions grouped into 4 thematic work areas of ways of working, data, methods and scientific understanding. Six actions have been identified to improve data in U.K. flood hydrology related to improving long term data quality, quantity and accessibility.
This project will contribute to the data strand actions:
- D1 - Review of all data sources relevant to flood hydrology – through providing an online open source of sub-daily hydrometric data.
Thank you for your contribution!
Help us reach out to more people in the community
Share this with family and friends