Groundwater and Surface Water Interactions

The USGS has the principal responsibility within the federal government to provide the hydrologic information and understanding needed by others to achieve the best use and management of the nation’s water resources. Basic data are the key to solving many water-quantity or -quality problems. Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana operate a large hydrologic network across the three states, collecting surface...

One of the strongest ways to ensure that science is done effectively and efficiently in the midst of ever decreasing budgets is to collaborate.

State and local agencies in Ohio (and to a limited extent, the USGS) collect, research, interpret, and disseminate groundwater data to characterize the groundwater resources of the State. To address these needs, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) and the Miami Conservancy District (MCD) monitor groundwater levels for more than 140 wells throughout Ohio. Personnel from the USGS Ohio...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservations Service and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have focused part of the National Water Quality Initiative (NWQI) on the School Branch watershed. The USGS is collaborating, through a Clean Water Act Section 319 grant, with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to accomplish NWQI nonpoint-source water-pollution...

Starting in 2000, the U.S. Geological Survey partnered with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management, the National Atmospheric Deposition Program, and the Lake Michigan Air Directors Consortium to investigate and monitor mercury in the environment in Indiana. This web page provides a list of publications and links to statewide studies of mercury in Indiana and regional mercury studies...

Arsenic is odorless and tasteless and can enter drinking-water supplies from natural deposits in rock and soil. In some parts of Ohio, arsenic concentrations in groundwater have exceeded the arsenic drinking-water standard of 10 parts per billion that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has set to protect consumers from the effects of long-term, chronic exposure to arsenic(U.S. Environmental...

Water-well drillers’ records are used to create maps and grids of hydrogeologic properties for the glaciated United States.

The Lake Erie and Lake Saint Clair (LERI) Basins in Indiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania comprise one of more than 50 study units that are part of the USGS National Water Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Program. The long-term goals of the NAWQA program are to describe the water-quality status and trends in a large representative part of the Nation's surface-water and groundwater...

The City of Columbus operates 5 high-capacity collector wells to extract groundwater for drinking-water supply. To assist the City, the USGS monitors water levels in 5 observation wells and operates a water-quality monitor on the Scioto River where specific conductance, temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, and turbidity are measured on an hourly basis. In addition, groundwater-level synoptic...

How much water is stored in the soil? Does agricultural management affect this? Will this change if temperatures increase and plants need more water? In order to answer this question, we have focused on the differences in soil physical properties under four land management types (forest, pasture, traditional agriculture, and conservation agriculture) and whether these differences effect how water...

What is the groundwater contribution to nitrates in surface water? That's the question we are trying to answer by looking at surface-water and groundwater interaction and the role each play in the movement of nitrates. We have added additional monitoring equipment to the USGS super gage Kankakee River at Davis, IN , which will allow us to calculate the nitrate load in groundwater using flow...

USGS is developing new and innovative ways to map the world around us.