New & Noteworthy

Press Release: Irrigation Causing Declines in the High Plains Aquifer

Press Release: New Study Lends Insight to Decreasing Denver Basin Groundwater Availability

Press Release: Groundwater Storage Losses Substantial Across Eight State Aquifer System

Report: Groundwater availability of the Mississippi embayment

Report: New tool to assess groundwater resources in the Mississippi embayment

Report: Selected approaches to estimate water-budget components of the High Plains, 1940-1949 and 2000-2009

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USGS Groundwater Watch

USGS maintains a network of active wells to provide basic statistics about groundwater levels.

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USGS in Your State

USGS Water Science Centers are located in each state.

Groundwater Model Development

The USGS is at the forefront of devising new techniques to solve practical problems in the study of groundwater resources. Predictive models are needed to make informed decisions in many emerging areas related to the effects of groundwater development. New models and methods enhance all USGS water programs. State and local governments as well as groundwater scientists and engineers in the private sector regularly use USGS models as an integral part of their work.

The USGS Modular Groundwater Flow Model (MODFLOW) is the most widely used program in the world for simulating groundwater flow. The USGS developed MODFLOW in the early 1980s. The Groundwater Resources Program (GWRP) continues to support the enhancement of MODFLOW with updates that help scientists and engineers simulate common features in groundwater systems. New features have been added and the software has been updated to incorporate advancements in our understanding of groundwater hydrology, to respond to changes in user needs, and to take advantage of constantly increasing computer power and speeds.

Below are examples of and links to USGS groundwater software:

• Recently Released USGS Groundwater Software
• Examples of USGS Groundwater Software
• More Information About USGS Groundwater Software

Recently Released USGS Groundwater Software 

USGS releases new software and updates existing software on an ongoing basis. The USGS software packages listed here are the most recent groundwater software releases and updates.

MODFLOW-NWT v.1.0.3

Jan 10, 2012: MODFLOW-NWT v.1.0.3 has been released. MODFLOW-NWT is a Newton formulation for MODFLOW-2005. MODFLOW-NWT is a standalone program that is intended for solving problems involving drying and rewetting nonlinearities of the unconfined groundwater-flow equation. This release includes several updates and bug fixes to the NWT Solver, Unsaturated-Zone Flow Package, Streamflow-Routing Package, and Lake Package. Refer to the release.txt for a lsit of all changes and complete details.

JupiterAPI v.1.7.0

Jan 10, 2012: JupiterAPI v.1.7.0 has been released. Jupiter API is the Joint Universal Parameter IdenTification and Evaluation of Reliability Application Programming Interface. Changes in this release include addition of a new subroutine that adds the capability to copy the contents of an input block. Three other subroutines were modified in a backward-compatible way to enable a programmer to generate copies of selected input blocks. No changes in algorithms were made. Refer to the release notes for complete list of changes.

ModelMuse v.2.12.0.0

Nov 11, 2011: ModelMuse v.2.12.0.0 has been released. ModelMuse is a graphical user interface (GUI) for MODFLOW-2005, MODFLOW-LGR, MODFLOW-NWT, and PHAST. This version corrects several bugs. This version adds includes several enhancements. In LGR models, Streams in the SFR package are now linked between grids. The GOFAIL option in MODFLOW-NWT is now supported. Refer to the version history for complete list of enhancements, changes, and bug fixes.

HUFPrint v1.2.1

Nov 11, 2011: HUFPrint v1.2.1 has been released. HUFPrint is a tabulation and visualization utility for the Hydrogeologic-Unit Flow (HUF) Package of MODFLOW. This release fixes a bug that had no computational impact on the program. See release history for details.

MODFLOW-GUI 4.34.0.0

Oct 12, 2011: MODFLOW-GUI v.4.34.0.0 has been released. MODFLOW-GUI provides preprocessor and postprocessor graphical-user interfaces for preparing MODFLOW-96, MODFLOW-2000, MODFLOW-2005, MOC3D, MODPATH, and ZONEBDGT input data and viewing model output for use within Argus Open Numerical Environments (Argus ONE). This release fixes multiple bugs and adds support for State variables in MODFLOW-GWM. Refer to the revision history for complete details.

GW_Chart 1.23.5.0

Oct 12, 2011: GW_Chart v.1.23.5.0 has been released. GW_Chart is a graphing application for MODFLOW, MOC3D, MODFLOW2000-GWT, ZONEBUDGET, SUTRA, MT3D, HST3D, UCODE-2005 and OPR-PPR. Also draws Piper diagrams. This release changes some captions have changed; displays the legend in ._os files; and fixes access violation when closing GW_Chart. Refer to the revision history for complete details.

MODFLOW-NWT 1.0.2

Oct 12, 2011: MODFLOW-NWT v.1.0.2 has been released. MODFLOW-NWT is a Newton formulation for MODFLOW-2005. MODFLOW-NWT is a standalone program that is intended for solving problems involving drying and rewetting nonlinearities of the unconfined groundwater-flow equation. This release includes several changes. This version requires much less memory to run models. Model execution is stopped when the convergence criteria are not met. Residual-control (backtracking) iterations are no longer counted as outer iterations. Another change was made to modify how groundwater heads are reset to the layer-bottom altitude when the calculated heads are below the bottom of the deepest layer. Refer to the release.txt for a lsit of all changes and complete details.

JupiterAPI 1.6.0

Oct 12, 2011: JupiterAPI v.1.6.0 has been released. Jupiter API is the Joint Universal Parameter IdenTification and Evaluation of Reliability Application Programming Interface. This release iincludes changes that affect output verbosity and formatting and the reliability of parallel processing; no changes in algorithms are involved. Refer to the release notes for complete list of changes.

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Selected USGS Groundwater Software

The software packages below are examples of key USGS groundwater software that has been developed with GWRP support.

Farm Process (FMP)

Farm Process estimates dynamically integrated supply-and-demand components of irrigated agriculture as part of the simulation of surface-water and groundwater flow based on MODFLOW-2000 and MODFLOW-2005.

GSFLOW: Groundwater and Surface-Water Flow Model

GSFLOW is a coupled groundwater and surface-water flow model based on the USGS Precipitation-Runoff Modeling System (PRMS) and MODFLOW-2005.

GWM-2005 with LGR

Groundwater Management Model Process 2005 is a Groundwater Management Process for the USGS modular three-dimensional groundwater model, MODFLOW-2005, using optimization with local grid refinement (LGR) capability.

MODFLOW-LGR

MODFLOW-LGR is a version of MODFLOW-2005 with local grid refinement.

SEAWAT: 3D Variable-Density Groundwater Flow and Transport

SEAWAT is a generic MODFLOW/MT3DMS-based computer program designed to simulate three-dimensional variable-density groundwater flow coupled with multi-species solute and heat transport.

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For More Information:

For more information or to download USGS groundwater software and supporting documentation, visit USGS Groundwater Software.

You can also learn more about how the USGS continues to lead in the development and application of groundwater modeling software.

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