Reports & Papers > Evaluating Net Groundwater Use

 

ITRC Paper No. P 14-005.  Daniel J. Howes, Charles Burt, and Lucas Hoffmann

Evaluating Net Groundwater Use from Remotely Sensed Evapotranspiration and Water Delivery Information

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A detailed, comprehensive, and accurate identification of groundwater aquifer properties will likely never be fully achieved because of the high degree of variability and costs that testing involves. Furthermore, accurate estimates of boundary conditions are essential for groundwater modeling so that investigations of improved management scenarios can be conducted. The lack of key input values at the ground surface boundary limits the ability to accurately assess aquifer dynamics. Of major importance is actual evapotranspiration (water consumption or the loss of water to the atmosphere through transpiration and evaporation). The Irrigation Training and Research Center (ITRC) modified remotely sensed satellite imagery for spatial computation of actual evapotranspiration at high resolution, and integrated it into groundwater models. This paper focuses on an additional tool to assist in the calibration of groundwater models, which results in the NET contribution to or extraction from groundwater (NTFGW). By comparing surface water deliveries, precipitation, runoff, and evapotranspiration, the NTFGW can be computed spatially throughout a region. This provides a critical set of known information, in addition to historic groundwater elevation data, that can be used in model calibration.

 

Howes, D.J., C.M. Burt, and L. Hoffmann. 2014. Evaluating Net Groundwater Use from Remotely Sensed Evapotranspiration and Water Delivery Information. Presented at Evaluating Net Groundwater Use from Remotely Sensed Evapotranspiration and Water Delivery Information. Irrigation Association Irrigation Show. Phoeniz, Arizona. November 17-21, 2014. 15 pp.


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