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Program Activities

National Streamflow Information Program (NSIP) (+$5,000,000). Streamflow information provides a foundation for understanding water availability. This initiative will provide $2 M to support required upgrade of data transmission radios at streamgages to ensure compatibility with the GOES system. Most of the remaining $3 M will support regional-scale studies for some of the Nation’s 21 Water Resources Regions and more intensive studies to increase understanding of key factors affecting water availability in selected watersheds or aquifer systems within these Regions. NSIP funds also will stabilize the long-term network by reestablishing up to 50 critical streamgages discontinued in the past 2 decades and create new cyber infrastructure for providing hydrologic data to the public. Finally, in FY08, the NSIP Program received an unrequested Congressional increase of $1,477,000 which is being used in the current year to provide for technology upgrades, flood hardening, and support for at-risk streamgages. The FY09 budget will be decreased by this amount, bringing the overall program change to $3.5 M.

Ground-Water Resources Program (GWRP) (+$3,000,000). Through the initiative, the GWRP will develop and apply methods to enhance the quality of the Nation's water-use information, expand ground-water data accessibility, and undertake new regional scale ground-water studies. As competition for water grows and conservation becomes more important, it is vital to have on-going information about water use and how it is changing over time. In accordance with National Research Council recommendations “Estimating Water Use in the United States: A New Paradigm for the National Water-Use Information Program” the initiative will devote significant resources to better understand and quantify water use in the Nation and to apply statistical rigor to the information that we use. To enhance the accessibility of ground-water data, we will follow up on the recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Water Information, Subcommittee on Ground Water and invest resources to expand our capability to share ground-water data across the many agencies that collect them. We will work with others so that useful data sets from all sources become available for the water resource assessment efforts of the USGS and the many State and local agencies involved in water resources. Finally, in conjunction with the NSIP funds, the GWRP will undertake regional-scale studies in the 21 Water Resources Regions and intensive studies in selected watersheds or aquifer systems. It will be the objective of this initiative to complete a study in each of the 21 Regions within the next 10 years. Assessments will draw on existing State water resources data and plans, as well as existing USGS ground-water, surface-water and water-use data. Results of the assessment will be published in USGS reports and all data will be permanently archived in Survey databases for future use. A series of indicators of water availability and use will be developed and an on-line statistical summary of these conditions will be created and updated as new assessments are completed.

National Cooperative Geologic Mapping Program (NCGMP) (+1,500,000). Understanding the structure of the geology that holds the ground water and influences the characteristics of streamflows is also of vital importance to this initiative. The USGS will utilize $1.5 M to enhance geologic mapping, geophysics and hydrogeologic knowledge of the regions being studied. This will be carried out in equal parts by USGS geologists (through the FEDMAP program) and in cooperation with the State Geological Surveys (through the STATEMAP Program) to map the geologic framework to improve our understanding of the hydrologic systems. Half of the funding will go to state geological surveys who match every federal dollar with a state dollar to further enhance the Program. Approximately 50 percent of National Cooperative Geologic Map Program funds support water resources projects across the Nation. In FY08, the NCGMP received a Congressional increase of $1,000,000, which is being used in the current year to support landslide hazard efforts related to wild fires in southern California, geologic mapping efforts in National Park Service (NPS) units, and geologic mapping for ground water along the U.S.-Mexico border. The FY09 budget will be decreased by this amount, bringing the overall Program change to $500,000. This decrease will also affect a number of state geologic mapping projects and the amount of funds leveraged by the states.