Groundwater

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) provides hydrologic, scientific, and technical expertise to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to address environmental and scientific issues at the Nevada National Security Sites (NNSS) and surrounding area. The NNSS, in Nye County, Nevada, was the site of historical nuclear testing. An overview of selected USGS program efforts in cooperation with DOE are...

The National Park Service, Nye County, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and USGS Nevada Water Science Center (NVWSC) have established a water-level and spring discharge monitoring network in the southern Amargosa Desert to identify long-term trends and monitor potential impacts of activities on groundwater resources. The Amargosa Integrated Monitoring Network (AIMN) continues the long-term...

The Virginia City Highlands and Highland Ranches (VC Highlands) are a rural residential housing area established along the ridge of the Virginia Range in Storey County, Nevada. Approximately 1,400 residents exclusively rely on domestic wells for water supply and domestic well depths range from 75 to 1,175 ft below land surface. NVWSC monitors water levels annually in two domestic wells in the VC...

The Humboldt River is in north-central Nevada. The river is about 330 miles long and provides water for mostly agricultural purposes. One of the largest industries in Nevada is gold mining and the majority of those mines are in the Humboldt River Basin on the Carlin Trend. Gold mines in Nevada produce 72 percent of all the gold in the U.S. and are the 5th largest in the world. In 2022, Nevada...

The Colorado River is one of the longest rivers in the Western United States. It begins in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and flows southwestward until it reaches Mexico where it becomes a small stream or dry riverbed. The Colorado River forms the border between southeastern Nevada and northwestern Arizona. In Nevada, Hoover Dam and Davis Dam control the flow of the river and create two...

From 2007 to 2021, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) collaborated with the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology on evaluating the forms of arsenic in Nevada groundwater resources. A total of 190 groundwater samples were collected from wells and springs throughout Nevada. Concentrations of arsenic ranged from <1.6 to 2,408 micrograms per liter (µg/L); in most cases, arsenate was the dominant species...

Demand for water resources in the Carson River basin is increasing due to steady population growth and the resulting development and changes in land and water use throughout the middle part of the basin. Agricultural land is being urbanized while land not previously irrigated may be converted for agricultural use.

High concentrations of phosphorus (P) and nitrogen (N) are responsible for excessive, or nuisance algal blooms in many ecosystems world-wide, and climate change is predicted to exacerbate the problem1,2. Excessive nutrients supplied to the nearshore zone of Lake Tahoe may have significant consequences to ecological communities, water clarity, and water quality. The nearshore zone represents the...

The multidisciplinary research team is made up of scientists from research institutes, universities, National laboratories, and the USGS. The USGS co-leaders for the team are Brian J. Andraski (ADRS Coordinator, Nevada Water Science Center) and David A. Stonestrom (National Research Program, California).

The Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS), in the northern Mojave Desert, is about 20 km east of Death Valley National Park. Recognizing the paucity of information on unsaturated-zone hydrology in arid regions, the USGS, in 1983, established the ADRS through agreements with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the State of Nevada. The ADRS serves as a field laboratory for the study of arid-land...

In 1976, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) began studies of unsaturated zone hydrology at a site in the Amargosa Desert near Beatty, Nevada, as part of the USGS Low-Level Radioactive Waste Program. The site is near disposal trenches for civilian waste. Over the years, USGS investigations at the Amargosa Desert Research Site (ADRS) have provided long-term "benchmark" information about the hydraulic...

The Nevada Water Science Center (NVWSC) is increasing the spatial understanding of the distribution of arsenic and important geochemical information in groundwater resources near select water-supply wells in southern Carson Valley by collecting groundwater samples to complement the existing dataset (2006 – 2015).