Modflow-setup: Robust automation of groundwater model construction

In an age of both big data and increasing strain on water resources, sound management decisions often rely numerical models. Numerical models provide a physics-based framework for assimilating making sense information that by itself only provides limited description the hydrologic system. Often, are best option quantifying even intuitively obvious connections between human activities resource impacts. However, despite many recent advances in model assimilation uncertainty quantification, process constructing remains laborious, expensive, opaque, precluding their use decision making. Modflow-setup aims to rapid consistent construction MODFLOW groundwater through robust repeatable automation. Common tasks distilled open-source, online code base is tested extensible collaborative version control. Input consists single configuration file summarizes workflow building model, including source data, options, output packages. Source providing structure parameter shapefiles, rasters, NetCDF files, tables, other (geolocated) sources read mapped discretization, using Flopy general open-source scientific Python libraries. few minutes, external array-based amenable estimation quantification produced. This paper describes core functionality Modflow-setup, worked example 6 evaluating pumping impacts lake central Wisconsin, United States.