Images

Bar chart showing use of water in 2015, by state and category of use

Source and Use of Water in the United States, 2015

This diagram uses a "cylinder and pipe" layout to show the source (surface water or groundwater) of the Nation's water and for what purposes the water was used in 2015. The data are broken out for each category of use by surface water and groundwater as the source.

Real-time flow meter installed on a center-pivot irrigation well in Mississippi County, Arkansas as part of a cooperative project conducted between USGS and the Arkansas Natural Resources Commission. The meter will measure water use for irrigation, providing data which will help improve water-use information in other locations as well.

Chattooga River, Middle Gorge, Wild and Scenic River, Jackson County, North Carolina

USGS Hydrologic Technician Kim Cesal measuring 3170 cfs at 12409000 Colville River at Kettle Falls, WA. This measurement is the highest made at the gaging site. The gage has been in operation since October 1922. The gage was installed to monitor flows from Meyer Falls Dam and Power Generation.

Photograph of Freeport McMoRan-Safford Copper Mine in Arizona. Photograph taken by Thomas J. Porter (USGS) on September 19, 2016, Latitude 32.85992 deg N, Longitude -109.622

Water flowing on the Colorado River near Moab, Utah. 

The entire Colorado River Basin currently supports 50 million people, and that amount is expected to increase by 23 million between 2000 and 2030. A new USGS study shows more than half of the streamflow in the Upper Colorado River Basin originates as groundwater. 

Thermoelectric power plant Bowen owned by Georgia Power Company, from Highway 113, Euharlee, Bartow County, Georgia. Plant Bowen is one of the largest coal-fired power plants in the United States. Plant Bowen uses recirculating cooling, decreasing the amount of water that must be withdrawn.

Trask River stage, discharge, and water-quality data are collected and used together to help monitor the current health of the river. Instream equipment is stored in protective housing to protect it from the elements. Data from the river are sent to equipment in the gage house, where it is stored then transmitted to USGS servers.

Screen capture of ModelMuse with a mesh for SUTRA being generated by GMSH. This image is intended to be used as a thumbnail for a video.

Etowah River, Bartow County, Georgia

The confluence of the Suiattle River (muddy river) into the Sauk River. 

Screen capture of ModelMuse with a mesh and the words "In SUTRA, some data are specified at nodes and some data are specified at elements."

This image is a screen capture of ModelMuse with the words "To define time schedules, select 'ModelSUTRA Time Controls.'"

Screen capture of ModelMuse with the words "Objects are used to specify boundary conditions and observations."

Screen capture of ModelMuse with a visualization of the SUTRA permeability. The image is intended to be used as a thumbnail for a video.

ModelMuse screen capture with the words "This video will show how to run SUTRA and view the model results."

ModelMuse screen capture with the text "This is the first of several videos that give an introduction to working with SUTRA in ModelMuse."

This video describes some of the most obvious changes to ModelMuse when working with SUTRA models.

ModelMuse screen capture to be used as a thumbnail for a video about creating meshes.

Drought Conditions in the lower Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River Basin in July 2011: USGS measured streamflow at 267 sites in the lower ACF Basin and western and central parts of the Aucilla–Suwanee–Ochlockonee River basin during July 2011 to measure the effects of drought and irrigation withdrawals on streamflow.