KATS: A GIS-BASED SPATIAL DECISION SUPPORT

TOOL FOR WATER RESOURCE MANAGEMENT IN KANSAS

Max Lu

John Harrington, Jr.

Department of Geography

Kansas State University

Manhattan, KS 66506

Growing demands for water from industrial, domestic and recreational uses and the increasing possibility of water contamination are making plans that coordinate the management, conservation and development of water resources more important than ever. Such plans must rely on a timely and comprehensive assessment of water resource conditions and trends of important water resource parameters so that the limited program and financial resources can be allocated to areas where the greatest efforts are warranted. The Kansas Water Quality Action Targeting System or KATS is a GIS-based spatial decision support tool designed at the HUC-11 watershed scale. KATS enables the identification, ranking and mapping of the value and vulnerability of both surface and ground water resources throughout the state. This study discusses the features of the existing system and identifies key elements that affect water resource vulnerability based on principal components analysis.