Tracking U.S. groundwater: Reserves for the future?

Environment

Volumn 48, Issue 3, 2006, Pages 10-25

  Alley, William M ^a,b,c  

^a U S GEOLOGICAL SURVEY   (United States)

^b NATIONAL GROUND WATER ASSOCIATION   (United States)

^c NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

DRINKING WATER; GROUND WATER; SURFACE WATER;

AQUIFER; ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT; ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING; ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY; IRRIGATION (AGRICULTURE); LAKE; POLICY; REVIEW; STREAM (RIVER); UNITED STATES; WATER CONTAMINATION; WATER QUALITY; WATER SUPPLY; WETLAND;

EID: 33645372262     PISSN: 00139157     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.3200/ENVT.48.3.10-25     Document Type: Review

References (33)

1. Single geologic units may define aquifers. Alternately, multiple aquifers and surrounding lower permeability units may be collectively referred to as "aquifer systems." The two terms are used somewhat interchangeably in this article, with "aquifer systems" used when an emphasis is placed on aquifers as hydrologic systems. The Ground Water Atlas of the United States describes many of the important aquifers of the nation and can be found at http://capp.water.usgs.gov/gwa/.
2. W. M. Alley, R. W. Healy, J. W. LaBaugh, and T. E. Reilly, "Flow and Storage in Groundwater Systems," Science 296, 5575 (14 June 2002); 1985-90.
3. National Research Council, Confronting the Nation's Water Problems: The Role of Research (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2004), 187;
4. and L. F. Konikow and E. Kendy, "Groundwater Depletion: A Global Problem," Hydrogeology Journal 13, no. 1 (2005): 317-20.
5. G. M. Hornberger, "A Water Cycle Initiative," Ground Water 43, no. 6 (2005): 771.
6. Saturated thickness is the vertical thickness of the aquifer in which the pore spaces are filled (saturated) with water. Specific yield is the ratio of the volume of water that a saturated rock will yield by gravity drainage to the volume of the rock. Specific yield typically ranges from 0.05 to 0.3.
7. B. B. Wilson, D. P. Young, and R. W. Buddemeier, Exploring Relationships Between Water Table Elevations, Reported Water Use, and Aquifer Subunit Delineations, Kansas Geological Survey Open File Report 2002-25D (Lawrence, KS, 2002).
8. For example, in a well-known study, researchers found that most of the water pumped from the confined Dakota sandstone aquifer in South Dakota has come from confining beds. J. D. Bredehoeft, C. E. Neuzil, and P. C. D. Milly, Regional Flow in the Dakota Aquifer: A Study of the Role of Confining Layers, U.S. Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 2237 (Washington, DC, 1983).
9. G. L. Bertoldi, R. H. Johnston, and K. D. Evenson, Ground Water in the Central Valley, California-A Summary Report, U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1401-A (Washington, DC, 1991). Land subsidence is a gradual settling or sudden sinking of the Earth's surface. Several different processes can cause it. Most water-related subsidence occurs as a result of compaction of aquifer materials (as in the Central Valley), drainage and oxidation of organic soils, and the dissolution and collapse of limestone and other susceptible rocks forming sinkholes and similar features.
10. Ground Water in the Central Valley, California-A Summary Report, Ibid., page 27.
11. J. D. Bredehoeft, "Safe Yield and the Water Budget Myth," Ground Water 35, no. 6 (1997): 929.
12. R. J. Glennon, Water Follies: Groundwater Pumping and the Fate of America's Fresh Waters (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2004).
13. U.S. Department of the Interior, Water Management of the Regional Aquifer in the Sierra Vista Subwatershed, Arizona-2004 Report to Congress, prepared in consultation with the Secretaries of Agriculture and Defense and in cooperation with the Upper San Pedro Partnership in response to Public Law 108-136, Section 321, 30 March 2005.
14. Arizona Department of Water Resources, Upper San Pedro Basin Active Management Area Review Report (Phoenix, AZ, 2005) 3-25, http://www.azwater. gov/dwr/Content/Publications/files/UpperSanPedro/ UpperSanPedroBasinAMAReviewReport.pdf.
15. M. A. Maupin and N. L. Barber, Estimated Withdrawals from Principal Aquifers in the United States, 2000, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1279 (Reston, VA, 2005), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/circ1279.
16. M. R. Llamas and P. Martinez-Santos, "Intensive Groundwater Use: A Silent Revolution that Cannot be Ignored," Water Science and Technology 51, no. 8 (2005): 167-74.
17. B. L. Morris et al., Groundwater and its Susceptibility to Degradation: A Global Assessment of the Problem and Options for Management, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Early Warning and Assessment Report Series, RS 03-3 (Nairobi, Kenya, 2001).
18. National Research Council, Estimating Water Use in the United States (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 2002).
19. W. M. Alley, T. E. Reilly, and O. L. Franke, Sustainability of Ground-Water Resources, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1186 (Denver, CO, 1999), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/circ1186;
20. and W. M. Alley and S. A. Leake, "The Journey from Safe Yield to Sustainability," Ground Water 42, no. 1 (2004): 12-16.
21. W. A. Abderrahman, "Should Intensive Use of Non-renewable Groundwater Resources Always Be Rejected?" in R. Llamas and E. Custodio, eds., Intensive Use of Groundwater: Challenges and Opportunities (Lisse, Netherlands; A. A. Balkema, 2002), 191-203.
22. D. L. Galloway, W. M. Alley, P. M. Barlow, T. E. Reilly, and P. Tucci, Evolving Issues and Practices in Managing Ground-Water Resources: Case Studies on the Role of Science, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1247 (Reston, VA, 2003), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/circ1247.
23. C. J. Taylor and W. M. Alley, Ground-Water-Level Monitoring and the Importance of Long-Term Water-Level Data, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1217 (Denver, CO, 2001), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/circ1217.
24. O. E. Meinzer, "Introduction" in R. M. Leggette, et al., Report of the Committee on Observation Wells, United States Geological Survey, (unpublished manuscript on file in Reston, VA, 1935), 3.
25. H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment, The State of the Nation's Ecosystems: Measuring the Lands, Waters, and Living Resources of the United States (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002), http://www.heinzctr.org/ecosystems/report.html.
26. U.S. General Accountability Office, Watershed Management: Better Coordination of Data Collection Efforts Needed to Support Key Decisions, GAO-04-382 (Washington, DC, 2004).
27. M. Rodell and J. S. Famiglietti, "Detectability of Variations in Continental Water Storage from Satellite Observations of the Time Dependent Gravity Field," Water Resources Research 35 (1999): 2705-23.
28. For examples of the use of InSAR to understand groundwater systems, see G. W. Bawden, M. Sneed, S. V. Stork, and D. L. Galloway, Measuring Human-Induced Land Subsidence from Space, U.S. Geological Survey Fact Sheet 069-03 (Sacramento, CA, 2003), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/fs-069-03/.
29. National Ground Water Association, Ground Water Level and Quality Monitoring (2005) http://www.ngwa.org/pdf/monitoring7.pdf (accessed 8 February 2006).
30. P. M. Barlow et-al., Concepts for National Assessment of Water Availability and Use, U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1223 (Reston, VA, 2002), http://pubs.water.usgs.gov/circ1223.
31. G. E. Fogg, "Groundwater Quality Sustainability, Creeping. Normalcy, and a Research Agenda," Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs 37, no. 7 (2005): 247.
32. J. D. Bredehoeft, "The Conceptualization Model Problem-Surprise, " Hvdrogeology Journal 13, no. 1 (2005): 37-46.
33. Recently, the International Groundwater Resources Assessment Center (IGRAC) has been established to share data and information on groundwater resources worldwide, http://www.igrac.nl/.