Integrated data management: Where are we headed?

Current requirements in environmental data management constituted the basis for two NATO Advanced Research Workshops (ARWs) held in 1996 and 2001, which, through their contents, were intended as a response to the current needs in data management. The 2001 ARW was essentially the follow-up meeting of the previously organized ARW of 1996, the results of which were published by Kluwer Publishers under the title "Integrated Approach to Environmental Data Management Systems". Before elaborating further on the topic, it is considered useful to review the basic conclusions and recommendations derived at the 1996 Workshop and to decide where we are actually headed in integrated data management. This introductory chapter presents ail overview of these conclusions/recommendations as the point of departure for the remainder of the volume

The need for integrated approaches to environmental data management

The paper presented focuses on basic needs for data management and for integration of efforts towards information production as required by sound environmental decision making. Need for integrated approaches is indicated between: (a) each step of the data management system; (b) different disciplines involved in environmental monitoring; and (c) different countries so as to facilitate international exchange of information for the solution of global environmental problems

WATER-QUALITY MONITORING NETWORK DESIGN - A PROBLEM OF MULTIOBJECTIVE DECISION-MAKING

Hydrologic data network design is a fairly complicated problem where questions as to the number of gages required, time frequencies to be selected, and benefits/costs of monitoring still remain unresolved. These issues are intensified in case of water quality variables as they are more error-prone, costly, and time consuming to sample. The basic difficulty underlying the design and evaluation of monitoring systems is the lack of an objective criterion to assess: (a) the efficiency, and (b) cost-effectiveness of a network. A statistical procedure based on the entropy principle of information theory is proposed to address the evaluation of both factors. Efficiency is measured quantitatively in terms of the information produced by a network. Similarly, benefits of monitoring are described by informative measures for an objective evaluation of cost-effectiveness. The study presented demonstrates the applicability of the entropy method in assessing the efficiency and the benefits of an existing water quality monitoring network. The method is applied for temporal and spatial features of monitoring, handled as both separate and combined problems. The results are shown in the case of the highly polluted Porsuk River in Turkey. The strengths and shortcomings of the proposed methodology are discussed, with recommendations for future research on the application of the entropy principle in network design

Entropy-based design considerations for water quality monitoring networks

Assessment of water quality monitoring networks requires potential methods to delineate the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of current monitoring programs. To this end, the concept of entropy has been considered as a promising method in previous studies as it quantitatively measures the information produced by a network. The paper presented discusses an entropy-based approach for the assessment of combined spatial/temporal frequencies of monitoring networks. The results are demonstrated in the case of water quality data observed along the Mississippi River in Louisiana