USGS Monthly Groundwater News and Highlights: April 2, 2019

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Feature: Downloading and Visualizing USGS Groundwater Data

The USGS is committed to making data used in our published scientific studies publicly available. The public can access and download USGS groundwater information including:

• groundwater-level data from USGS studies and programs at over 850,000 groundwater sites;
• statistics on groundwater levels from about 20,000 wells that have been measured by the USGS or USGS cooperators at least once within the past 13 months;
• over 15,000 borehole geophysical logs; and
• USGS groundwater model data releases from recent USGS publications.

USGS strives constantly to improve our online data release and visualization tools. For example, USGS recently released a new interactive viewer to visualize groundwater resources in Gaines, Terry, and Yoakum Counties, Texas. Using the online tool, groundwater users, resource managers and scientists, can view data on groundwater levels, water-quality conditions, hydrogeologic unit extents, changes in groundwater conditions over time, and more. For an overview of the new tool, view the recent press release.

USGS Groundwater-Related Press Releases and Technical Announcements

Low-flying Helicopter Survey to Map Subsurface Geology and Groundwater Near Silverton, Colorado (3/25/2019)

Online Tool Illustrates Groundwater Resources in Texas Panhandle (3/22/2019)

USGS Groundwater-Related Publications

Cryptosporidium incidence and surface water influence of groundwater supplying public water systems in Minnesota, USA (03/21/19)

The Missouri groundwater-level observation network (03/25/19)

Constraining the oxygen isotopic composition of nitrate produced by nitrification (03/14/19)

Geomorphic survey of North Fork Eagle Creek, New Mexico, 2017 (03/15/19)

Groundwater and surface-water data collection for Mason County, western Washington, 2016-18 (03/15/19)

Water-balance modeling of selected lakes for evaluating viability as long-term fisheries in Kidder, Logan, and Stutsman Counties, North Dakota (03/12/19)

Water quality and hydrology of the Yellow Dog and Salmon Trout Watersheds, Marquette County, Michigan 2013-16 (03/11/19)

Heat and mass transport in a vapor-dominated hydrothermal area in Yellowstone National Park, USA: Inferences from magnetic, electrical, electromagnetic, subsurface temperature and diffuse CO2 flux measurements (03/04/19)

Adjudicating groundwater: A judge's guide to understanding groundwater and modeling (03/19/19)

Water use in Louisiana, 2015 (03/01/19)

 

Field Photo

Did you know USGS uses geophysics to study groundwater? Hydrogeophysical tools can provide data that USGS scientists use to improve our understanding of groundwater levels, groundwater quality, and the structure of the ground below us. In these photos, USGS scientists from Texas are preparing geophysical tools as part of recent groundwater studies. The data were used to improve the spatial coverage of available information and to reduce uncertainty regarding hydrogeologic unit extents. The results provided a refined understanding of how the saturated thickness of the Ogallala and Edwards-Trinity aquifers vary throughout the study area, as summarized in a USGS article and in a new online USGS data viewer for the Southern High Plains study area. In the top photo, a scientist is collecting time-domain electromagnetic soundings. In the bottom photo, scientists are setting up the nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) geophysical logging cable to collect information from a groundwater well.

Archive of Past Highlights:

Past monthly summaries are available online.