Method to support Total Maximum Daily Load development using hydrologic alteration as a surrogate to address aquatic life impairment in New Jersey streams
Jonathan G. Kennen, Melissa L. Riskin, Pamela A. Reilly, Susan J. Colarullo
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5089
More than 300 ambient monitoring sites in New Jersey have been identified by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) in its integrated water-quality monitoring and assessment report (that is, the 305(b) Report on general water quality and 303(d) List of waters that do not support their designated uses)...
Hybrid modeling of spatial continuity for application to numerical inverse problems
Michael J. Friedel, Fabio Iwashita
2013, Environmental Modelling and Software (43) 60-79
A novel two-step modeling approach is presented to obtain optimal starting values and geostatistical constraints for numerical inverse problems otherwise characterized by spatially-limited field data. First, a type of unsupervised neural network, called the self-organizing map (SOM), is trained to recognize nonlinear relations among environmental variables (covariates) occurring at various...
Knowledge and understanding of dissolved solids in the Rio Grande–San Acacia, New Mexico, to Fort Quitman, Texas, and plan for future studies and monitoring
Douglas Moyer, Scott K. Anderholm, James F. Hogan, Fred M. Phillips, Barry J. Hibbs, James C. Witcher, Anne Marie Matherne, Sarah E. Falk
2013, Open-File Report 2013-1190
Availability of water in the Rio Grande Basin has long been a primary concern for water-resource managers. The transport and delivery of water in the basin have been engineered by using reservoirs, irrigation canals and drains, and transmountain-water diversions to meet the agricultural, residential, and industrial demand. In contrast, despite...
Land change in the Central Corn Belt Plains Ecoregion and hydrologic consequences in developed areas: 1939-2000
Krista Karstensen, David Shaver, Randal Alexander, Thomas Over, David T. Soong
2013, Open-File Report 2013-1157
This report emphasizes the importance of a multi-disciplinary understanding of how land use and land cover can affect regional hydrology by collaboratively investigating how increases in developed land area may affect stream discharge by evaluating land-cover change from 1939 to 2000, urban housing density data from 1940 to 2010, and...
Relation between organic-wastewater compounds, groundwater geochemistry, and well characteristics for selected wells in Lansing, Michigan
Sheridan K. Haack, Carol L. Luukkonen
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5139
In 2010, groundwater from 20 Lansing Board of Water and Light (BWL) production wells was tested for 69 organic-wastewater compounds (OWCs). The OWCs detected in one-half of the sampled wells are widely used in industrial and environmental applications and commonly occur in many wastes and stormwater. To identify factors that...
Simulated effects of proposed Arkansas Valley Conduit on hydrodynamics and water quality for projected demands through 2070, Pueblo Reservoir, southeastern Colorado
Roderick F. Ortiz
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5119
The purpose of the Arkansas Valley Conduit (AVC) is to deliver water for municipal and industrial use within the boundaries of the Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District. Water supplied through the AVC would serve two needs: (1) to supplement or replace existing poor-quality water to communities downstream from Pueblo Reservoir;...
Economic resilience through "One-Water" management
Randall T. Hanson, Wolfgang Schmid
2013, Open-File Report 2013-1175
Disruption of water availability leads to food scarcity and loss of economic opportunity. Development of effective water-resource policies and management strategies could provide resiliance to local economies in the face of water disruptions such as drought, flood, and climate change. To accomplish this, a detailed understanding of human water use...
Flood hydrology and dam-breach hydraulic analyses of five reservoirs in Colorado
Michael R. Stevens, Galen K. Hoogestraat
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2012-5097
The U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service has identified hazard concerns for areas downstream from five Colorado dams on Forest Service land. In 2009, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Forest Service, initiated a flood hydrology analysis to estimate the areal extent of potential downstream flood inundation and...
2011 floods of the central United States
Water Resources Division, U.S. Geological Survey
2013, Professional Paper 1798
The Central United States experienced record-setting flooding during 2011, with floods that extended from headwater streams in the Rocky Mountains, to transboundary rivers in the upper Midwest and Northern Plains, to the deep and wide sand-bedded lower Mississippi River. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), as part of its mission, collected...
Projections and downscaling of 21st century temperatures, precipitation, radiative fluxes and winds for the southwestern US, with focus on the Lake Tahoe basin
Michael D. Dettinger
2013, Climatic Change (116) 17-33
Recent projections of global climate changes in response to increasing greenhouse-gas concentrations in the atmosphere include warming in the Southwestern US and, especially, in the vicinity of Lake Tahoe of from about +3°C to +6°C by end of century and changes in precipitation on the order of 5-10 % increases...
A conceptual framework for Lake Michigan coastal/nearshore ecosystems, with application to Lake Michigan Lakewide Management Plan (LaMP) objectives
Paul W. Seelbach, Lisa R. Fogarty, David Bo Bunnell, Sheridan K. Haack, Mark W. Rogers
2013, Open-File Report 2013-1138
The Lakewide Management Plans (LaMPs) within the Great Lakes region are examples of broad-scale, collaborative resource-management efforts that require a sound ecosystems approach. Yet, the LaMP process is lacking a holistic framework that allows these individual actions to be planned and understood within the broader context of the Great Lakes...
USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species database with a focus on the introduced fishes of the lower Tennessee and Cumberland drainages
Pamela L. Fuller, Matthew Cannister
Rebecca Johansen, Dwayne Estes, Steven W. Hamilton, Andrew N. Barrass, editor(s)
2013, Conference Paper, Proceedings of the 14th Symposium on the Natural History of Lower Tennessee and Cumberland River Valleys
The Nonindigenous Aquatic Species (NAS) database (http://nas.er.usgs.gov) functions as a national repository and clearinghouse for occurrence data for introduced species within the United States. Included is locality information on over 1,100 species of vertebrates, invertebrates, and vascular plants introduced as early as 1850. Taxa include foreign (exotic) species and species...
Quantifying wetland–aquifer interactions in a humid subtropical climate region: An integrated approach
Itza Mendoza-Sanchez, Mantha S. Phanikumar, Jie Niu, Jason R. Masoner, Isabelle M. Cozzarelli, Jennifer T. McGuire
2013, Journal of Hydrology (498) 237-253
Wetlands are widely recognized as sentinels of global climate change. Long-term monitoring data combined with process-based modeling has the potential to shed light on key processes and how they change over time. This paper reports the development and application of a simple water balance model based on long-term climate, soil,...
Phenology-based, remote sensing of post-burn disturbance windows in rangelands
Joel B. Sankeya, Cynthia S.A. Wallace, Sujith Ravi
2013, Ecological Indicators (30) 35-44
Wildland fire activity has increased in many parts of the world in recent decades. Ecological disturbance by fire can accelerate ecosystem degradation processes such as erosion due to combustion of vegetation that otherwise provides protective cover to the soil surface. This study employed a novel ecological indicator based on remote...
Geologic effects on groundwater salinity and discharge into an estuary
Christopher J. Russonielloa, Cristina Fernandeza, John F. Bratton, Joel F. Banaszakc, David E. Krantzc, Scott Andresd, Leonard F. Konikow, Holly A. Michaela
2013, Journal of Hydrology (498) 1-12
Submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) can be an important pathway for transport of nutrients and contaminants to estuaries. A better understanding of the geologic and hydrologic controls on these fluxes is critical for their estimation and management. We examined geologic features, porewater salinity, and SGD rates and patterns at an estuarine...
National assessment of geologic carbon dioxide storage resources: results
U.S. Geological Survey Geologic Carbon Dioxide Storage Resources Assessment Team
2013, Circular 1386
In 2012, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) completed an assessment of the technically accessible storage resources (TASR) for carbon dioxide (CO2) in geologic formations underlying the onshore and State waters area of the United States. The formations assessed are at least 3,000 feet (914 meters) below the ground surface. The...
National assessment of geologic carbon dioxide storage resources: summary
U.S. Geological Survey Geologic Carbon Dioxide Storage Resources Assessment Team
2013, Fact Sheet 2013-3020
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) recently completed an evaluation of the technically accessible storage resource (TASR) for carbon dioxide (CO2) for 36 sedimentary basins in the onshore areas and State waters of the United States. The TASR is an estimate of the geologic storage resource that may be available for...
Fine-scale hydrologic modeling for regional landscape applications: the California Basin Characterization Model development and performance
Lorraine E. Flint, Alan L. Flint, James H. Thorne, Ryan Boynton
2013, Ecological Processes (2) 1-21
IntroductionResource managers need spatially explicit models of hydrologic response to changes in key climatic drivers across variable landscape conditions. We demonstrate the utility of a Basin Characterization Model for California (CA-BCM) to integrate high-resolution data on physical watershed characteristics with historical or projected climate data to...
Emerging methods for the study of coastal ecosystem landscape structure and change
John Brock, Jeffrey J. Danielson, Sam Purkis
2013, International Journal of Remote Sensing (34) 6283-6285
Coastal landscapes are heterogeneous, dynamic, and evolve over a range of time scales due to intertwined climatic, geologic, hydrologic, biologic, and meteorological processes, and are also heavily impacted by human development, commercial activities, and resource extraction. A diversity of complex coastal systems around the globe, spanning glaciated shorelines to tropical...
Variations of iron flux and organic carbon remineralization in a subterranean estuary caused by interannual variations in recharge
Moutusi Roy, Jonathan B. Martin, Jaye E. Cable, Christopher G. Smith
2013, Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta (103) 301-315
We determine the inter-annual variations in diagenetic reaction rates of sedimentary iron (Fe ) in an east Florida subterranean estuary and evaluate the connection between metal fluxes and recharge to the coastal aquifer. Over the three-year study period (from 2004 to 2007), the amount of Fe-oxides reduced at the...
Pre- and post-impoundment nitrogen in the lower Missouri River
Dale W. Blevins, Donald H. Wilkison, Shelley L. Niesen
2013, Hydrological Processes (28) 2535-2549
Large water-sample sets collected from 1899 through 1902, 1907, and in the early 1950s allow comparisons of pre-impoundment and post-impoundment (1969 through 2008) nitrogen concentrations in the lower Missouri River. Although urban wastes were not large enough to detectably increase annual loads of total nitrogen at the beginning of the...
On the conversion of tritium units to mass fractions for hydrologic applications
David A. Stonestrom, Brian J. Andraski, Clay A. Cooper, Charles J. Mayers, Robert L. Michel
2013, Isotopes in Environmental and Health Studies (49) 250-256
We develop a general equation for converting laboratory-reported tritium levels, expressed either as concentrations (tritium isotope number fractions) or mass-based specific activities, to mass fractions in aqueous systems. Assuming that all tritium is in the form of monotritiated water simplifies the derivation and is shown to be reasonable for most...
Mercury cycling in agricultural and managed wetlands of California: seasonal influences of vegetation on mercury methylation, storage, and transport
Lisamarie Windham-Myers, Mark C. Marvin-DiPasquale, Evangelos Kakouros, Jennifer L. Agee, Le H. Kieu, Craig A. Stricker, Jacob A. Fleck, Joshua T. Ackerman
2013, Science of the Total Environment
Plants are a dominant biologic and physical component of many wetland capable of influencing the internal pools and fluxes of methylmercury (MeHg). To investigate their role with respect to the latter, we examined the changing seasonal roles of vegetation biomass and Hg, C and N composition from May 2007-February 2008...
Hydrogeology, groundwater seepage, nitrate distribution, and flux at the Raleigh hydrologic research station, Wake County, North Carolina, 2005-2007
Kristen Bukowski McSwain, Richard E. Bolich, Melinda J. Chapman
2013, Scientific Investigations Report 2013-5041
rom 2005 to 2007, the U.S. Geological Survey and the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Division of Water Quality, conducted a study to describe the geologic framework, measure groundwater quality, characterize the groundwater-flow system, and describe the groundwater/surface-water interaction at the 60-acre Raleigh hydrogeologic research station (RHRS)...
Occurrence and mobility of mercury in groundwater: Chapter 5
Julia L. Barringer, Zoltan Szabo, Pamela A. Reilly
Paul M. Bradley, editor(s)
2013, Book chapter, Current perspectives in contaminant hydrology and water resources sustainability
1. Introduction 1.1. FORMS, TOXICITY, AND HEALTH EFFECTS Mercury (Hg) has long been identified as an element that is injurious, even lethal, to living organisms. Exposure to its inorganic form, mainly from elemental Hg (Hg(0)) vapor (Fitzgerald & Lamborg, 2007) can cause damage to respiratory, neural,...
