Most of the models required to transition to Source have been completed. Each of Victoria’s river and water supply systems across our 29 river basins may require one or more models. Each can take anywhere from 2 to 18 months to complete.
This includes water-sharing arrangements, the impact of policy and regulation as well as future impacts of a drier climate under climate change.
With this software, Victoria can effectively support integrated water resource management decisions, including operational activities and catchment management in the coming decades.
The benefits of Source include:
- better-informed decisions
- supporting improved operational efficiency and risk management
- improved management of environmental flow delivery, surface water storage, delivery for shared benefits and balancing water between different users
- improved management of water trade and carryover
- better able to meet Murray-Darling Basin Plan obligations
From 2018 to 2022, DEECA developed and implemented a transition strategy to move water resource models for all major Victorian systems to the Source platform. Foundational versions of these models have been completed, with continuing development and improvement activities progressing for the more complex models.
Steamer Plain near Budgee Ck, image credit: Keith Ward
Source improves the guidance and information available for Victorian water policy and water resource planning and management.
Hydrological modelling has long played an important role for informing and guiding Victorian water policy and water resource planning and management decision-making.
The Council of Australian Governments (COAG) endorsed a National Hydrological Modelling Strategy (NHMS) in 2008 to support and enhance hydrologic modelling. NHMS seeks to ensure future water planning and management across Australia is informed by best practice modelling. An integrated river basin water resources modelling platform known as Source is the key deliverable of the strategy.
The platform has been developed and maintained by eWater Limited, a joint government-owned, not-for-profit partnership, of which the State of Victoria is a company member.
Source is Australia’s National Hydrological Modelling Platform, designed to simulate all aspects of water resource systems to support integrated planning, operations and governance from urban, catchment to river basin scales including human and ecological influences.
For more information on Source please visit the eWater website.
Any water supply system can be configured using Source as a network of nodes and carriers representing reservoirs, demand centres, waterways, pipes, etc.
It can be used as a 'what if' tool to address various options, such as changes in operating rules, or physical system modifications. System changes can be quickly and easily configured and their effects investigated.
A wide range of operating rules can be modelled either directly or indirectly by exploiting the basic set of node and carrier types and their corresponding attributes.
The user can specify the desired level of detail of output from the model. Output can be presented graphically, either in raw form or after post-processing using a suite of utility programs separate from the simulation model.
Input and output data files have the same format and can be easily transferred to commercially available word processing and spreadsheet packages such as Microsoft Office to enhance presentation or to perform more detailed analyses.
Page last updated: 18/05/23