New Jersey WSC Archived Projects
The pace of development in Hopewell Township increased substantially in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Concurrent with this has been an increased awareness of the township’s finite water resources and the potential for environmental degradation from increased ground-water withdrawals and reduced ground-water recharge. The goal of this project is to provide a long-term, easily accessed data base so that the general response of the hydrologic system to natural climatic variations and inducted stresses can be determined and be readily available to township officials and the public.
START DATE: 03-MAR-2008
END DATE: 03-SEP-2012
PROJECT NUMBER: LJ00DD6
STUDY OBJECTIVES:
Provide a long-term, easily accessed data base so that the general response of the hydrologic system to natural climatic variations and inducted stresses can be determined and be readily available to township officials and the public. Collection of high-quality data allow potential problems to be identified early enough to allow proper planning and management and withstand challenges by opponents to efforts for remediation. Ground-water observation wells located both close to and far from withdrawal wells allow the effects of ground-water withdrawals to be estimated. There are no continuous-record streamflow sites within Hopewell Township but base-flow data from small streams can be statistically correlated with nearby continuous-record station data and used to estimate, for example, mean annual discharge for the small streams and estimate effects of ground-water withdrawals on surface-water flow.
STATEMENT OF PROBLEM:
The pace of development in Hopewell Township increased substantially in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Concurrent with this has been an increased awareness of the township’s finite water resources and the potential for environmental degradation from increased ground-water withdrawals and reduced ground-water recharge. Furthermore, ground-water withdrawals by Pennington and Hopewell Boroughs (about 100 and 50 million gallons per year (Mgal/yr), respectively) affect ground-water levels and ground-water discharge (base flow) to streams in Hopewell Township.
STRATEGY AND APPROACH:
Ground-water-level measurements will be made at 3 observation wells in Hopewell Township. Volunteer services will facilitate installation and servicing of data loggers. Water-level data will be quality assured and entered into the USGS national database, which is readily internet-accessible to the public.
About 4 streamflow measurements will be made at each of 6 partial-record stations on small streams in the township. Where possible, a V-notch weir will be installed to simplify long-term collection low-flow data. The weirs will be calibrated with wading or volumetric measurements. Where installation of a weir is not possible, wading measurements will be made. Flow data will be quality assured and entered into the USGS national database. When all measurements have been made, flow data will be statistically correlated with same-day data collected at nearby continuous-record stations. Results of the correlations will allow estimation of flow statistics (such as mean annual flow) for the Hopewell Township partial-record stations.
Assistance from the Hopewell Township Dept. of Public Works will be required to make the steel v-notch weirs and install the weirs.
DISCLAIMER: This webpage contains information about completed or inactive projects from the NJ Water Science Center. It has been created for historical purposes and may be a utility to locate published information. This page should not be considered an authoritative source. You are encouraged to contact the NJ WSC for more current information.
The pace of development in Hopewell Township increased substantially in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Concurrent with this has been an increased awareness of the township’s finite water resources and the potential for environmental degradation from increased ground-water withdrawals and reduced ground-water recharge. The goal of this project is to provide a long-term, easily accessed data base so that the general response of the hydrologic system to natural climatic variations and inducted stresses can be determined and be readily available to township officials and the public.
START DATE: 03-MAR-2008
END DATE: 03-SEP-2012
PROJECT NUMBER: LJ00DD6
STUDY OBJECTIVES:
Provide a long-term, easily accessed data base so that the general response of the hydrologic system to natural climatic variations and inducted stresses can be determined and be readily available to township officials and the public. Collection of high-quality data allow potential problems to be identified early enough to allow proper planning and management and withstand challenges by opponents to efforts for remediation. Ground-water observation wells located both close to and far from withdrawal wells allow the effects of ground-water withdrawals to be estimated. There are no continuous-record streamflow sites within Hopewell Township but base-flow data from small streams can be statistically correlated with nearby continuous-record station data and used to estimate, for example, mean annual discharge for the small streams and estimate effects of ground-water withdrawals on surface-water flow.
STATEMENT OF PROBLEM:
The pace of development in Hopewell Township increased substantially in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Concurrent with this has been an increased awareness of the township’s finite water resources and the potential for environmental degradation from increased ground-water withdrawals and reduced ground-water recharge. Furthermore, ground-water withdrawals by Pennington and Hopewell Boroughs (about 100 and 50 million gallons per year (Mgal/yr), respectively) affect ground-water levels and ground-water discharge (base flow) to streams in Hopewell Township.
STRATEGY AND APPROACH:
Ground-water-level measurements will be made at 3 observation wells in Hopewell Township. Volunteer services will facilitate installation and servicing of data loggers. Water-level data will be quality assured and entered into the USGS national database, which is readily internet-accessible to the public.
About 4 streamflow measurements will be made at each of 6 partial-record stations on small streams in the township. Where possible, a V-notch weir will be installed to simplify long-term collection low-flow data. The weirs will be calibrated with wading or volumetric measurements. Where installation of a weir is not possible, wading measurements will be made. Flow data will be quality assured and entered into the USGS national database. When all measurements have been made, flow data will be statistically correlated with same-day data collected at nearby continuous-record stations. Results of the correlations will allow estimation of flow statistics (such as mean annual flow) for the Hopewell Township partial-record stations.
Assistance from the Hopewell Township Dept. of Public Works will be required to make the steel v-notch weirs and install the weirs.
DISCLAIMER: This webpage contains information about completed or inactive projects from the NJ Water Science Center. It has been created for historical purposes and may be a utility to locate published information. This page should not be considered an authoritative source. You are encouraged to contact the NJ WSC for more current information.