Structuring Multidisciplinary Knowledge for Model Based Water Management: The HarmoniQuA Approach

In the last decade a strong need for Quality Assurance has emerged among professionals in model based water management. The manifold of reasons for this can be summarised as follows. There is a lack of mutual understanding between modellers, model study clients, model auditors, stakeholders and concerned members of the public. Furthermore, malpractice (careless handling of input data, insufficient calibration/validation and model use outside of its scope) promotes a growing disbelief in the competence of models to support decision-making. This growing disbelief is fuelled by the tendency of modellers to oversell model capabilities. Several initiatives claim to support Quality Assurance in model based water management, but these focus on single domains and usually have chosen a textbook approach to provide guidelines and fillin forms to monitor modelling. The EC funded project HarmoniQuA aims at supporting the full modelling process by offering computer based guidance for all water management domains, different types of users, different types of modelling purposes (planning, design and operational management) and different levels of modelling complexity. In addition to the guidance, users are helped to record all what they do and to produce for a diverse audience dedicated reports. Finally, HarmoniQuA intends to facilitate co-operation between groups within and between modelling studies and let its users learn from other modelling studies. The HarmoniQuA system consists of a knowledge base and a toolbox. This paper will discuss scientific, technical and organisational considerations behind the HarmoniQuA approach for integrated modelling support. These considerations can be divided into two groups, one related to the expertise of modellers, the other to knowledge engineering. An ontological approach, originating from knowledge engineering technology, is perfectly equipped to design a structure for the modelling knowledge base, which is filled with the expertise of modellers and to design the structure for recording the modelling process in so called model journals. The HarmoniQuA toolbox uses the knowledge base to generate dedicated guidelines for the variety of users and fills (instances of) the model journal ontology with actual data of a modelling process.