GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA OPEN FILE 9191 Canada1Water classification of the National Hydro Network: stream order and graph refinement E.D. Kessel, S.K. Frey, and H.A.J. Russell 2024
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA OPEN FILE 9191 Canada1Water classification of the National Hydro Network: stream order and graph refinement E.D. Kessel1, S.K. Frey1, and H.A.J. Russell2 1Aquanty Inc., 600 Weber St. N., Unit B, Waterloo, Ontario N2V 1K4 2Natural Resources Canada, Geological Survey of Canada, 601 Booth Street, Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0E8 2024 © His Majesty the King in Right of Canada, as represented by the Minister of Natural Resources, 2024 Information contained in this publication or product may be reproduced, in part or in whole, and by any means, for personal or public non-commercial purposes, without charge or further permission, unless otherwise specified. You are asked to: • exercise due diligence in ensuring the accuracy of the materials reproduced; • indicate the complete title of the materials reproduced, and the name of the author organization; and • indicate that the reproduction is a copy of an official work that is published by Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) and that the reproduction has not been produced in affiliation with, or with the endorsement of, NRCan. Commercial reproduction and distribution is prohibited except with written permission from NRCan. For more information, contact NRCan at
[email protected]. This publication is available for free download through the NRCan Open Science and Technology Repository (https://ostrnrcan-dostrncan.canada.ca/). Recommended citation Kessel, E.D., Frey, S.K., and Russell, H.A.J., 2024. Canada1Water classification of the National Hydro Network: stream order and graph refinement; Geological Survey of Canada, Open File 9191, 13 p. https://doi.org/10.4095/pyc51h1rm4 Publications in this series have not been edited; they are released as submitted by the author. ISSN 2816-7155 ISBN 978-0-660-72598-7 Catalogue No. M183-2/9191E-PDF https://doi.org/10.4095/pyc51h1rm4
1 Abstract A vector representation of stream networks is a crucial dataset for the modelling of the surface water and groundwater components of the hydrologic cycle. For many usages an important property of the drainage network is a digital topology and hierarchal stream order attribute (e.g., Strahler stream order). In Canada jurisdictional stream networks are available for the provinces and territories and nationally for Canada in the National Hydrological Network (NHN) dataset. Unfortunately, the NHN data lacks the same topological and attribute information that is available for numerous provinces due to standardization for the entire country. For Canada1Water it was also necessary to have a harmonized dataset with the United States, for both the southern transboundary watersheds and the Alaskan watersheds. This report documents the processes completed to upgrade the topological and graph network support for NHN and provide continuous connectivity with US datasets. It also highlights and corrects a number of stream density and stream order issues that occur within Canada across provincial and territorial borders and NTS tiles. All vector processing was completed in RivEX software extension for ArcMap. Following complete topological correction, stream classification was assigned and a table of the node graph network developed. Additional work was then completed to normalize stream density particularly amongst low-order streams between British Columbia and the Yukon and amongst local NTS tiles in Quebec and Ontario. Corrected NHN Strahler stream order assignment was validated against a number of provincial and watershed datasets, all of which already have Strahler stream order attributed. These datasets are the same underlying digitized vector data, so there are no differences in node or polyline positions. Strahler stream order assignment validation was only done by visual comparison as due to differences in vector segments a statistical comparison is complicated. The transboundary integrated C1W stream network with complete classification provides a seamless national dataset to support transdisciplinary studies (fisheries, wildlife, health, pesticide and nutrient issues, mining impact, ecosystem restoration, numeric modelling) that involve a knowledge of stream distribution and ranking.
