Water Budgets

USGS is undertaking a 3-year study of water use, availability, and change in the Upper Rio Grande Basin in one of several national “Focus Area Studies” in the Department of Interior’s WaterSMART initiative . The Upper Rio Grande study area runs 670 miles from its headwaters in Colorado through New Mexico and northern Mexico to Ft. Quitman, Texas. Along its river corridor, it is a primary source of...

The USGS is undertaking a 3-year study of water use, availability, and change in the Red River basin in one of several national “Focus Area Studies” in the Department of Interior’s WaterSMART initiative . The Red River basin covers more than 93,000 square miles in New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana with a population of about 4.3 million people. Water resources in the basin are...

In 2016, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the San Antonio Water System, began a study to refine previously derived estimates of groundwater outflows from Medina and Diversion Lakes in south-central Texas near San Antonio.

In 2014, USGS, in cooperation with Llano Estacado Underground Water Conservation District , Sandy Land Underground Water District , and South Plains Underground Water Conservation District , began a multiphase project to develop a regional conceptual model of the hydrogeologic framework and geochemistry of the Ogallala, Edwards-Trinity, and Dockum aquifers. The Ogallala aquifer is the shallowest...

Successful long term stewardship of Fort Bliss lands includes managing traditional hydrologic resources such as surface water and groundwater resources and increasingly, geologic resources such as geothermal reservoirs and deep well injection locations. The USGS Texas Water Science Center is developing a garrison-wide hydrogeologic atlas that describes the hydrology and hydrogeology of Fort Bliss...

USGS Texas Water Science Center scientists are evaluating potential changes in the hydrologic budget, specifically evapotranspiration, as a result of brush management (applied to huisache) as a conservation practice.

USGS is undertaking a 5-year study to assess groundwater availability for the aquifers proximal to the Gulf of Mexico from the Texas-Mexico border through the panhandle of Florida, known as the Coastal Lowlands Aquifer System (CLAS). This study is one of several within the Regional Groundwater Availability Studies of the USGS Water Availability and Use Science Program .

The Oklahoma-Texas Water Science Center performs computer simulations using MODFLOW to simulate groundwater/surface-water interaction, quantify groundwater resources, and evaluate the effects of withdrawals on future groundwater supplies for aquifers in Oklahoma and Texas.