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Leveraging Earth Observations and In Situ Data in Support of Groundwater Sustainability
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  • Norm Jones,
  • Steven Evans,
  • Travis McStraw,
  • Jim Nelson,
  • Daniel Ames,
  • James Greer
Norm Jones
Brigham Young University

Corresponding Author:njones@byu.edu

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Steven Evans
Brigham Young University
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Travis McStraw
Brigham Young University
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Jim Nelson
Brigham Young University
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Daniel Ames
Brigham Young University
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James Greer
State of Utah
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Abstract

Water managers face the daunting task of managing freshwater resources in the face of industrialization and population growth. As surface water resources become fully allocated, increased groundwater use can fill the void, particularly during periods of drought. Improper groundwater management can result in reduced water quality, land subsidence, increased pumping costs, and in some cases, the complete exhaustion of an aquifer and the loss of groundwater as a buffer during times of drought. Assessing the long-term impact of various groundwater management decisions can be difficult and costly, and therefore many decisions are made without sufficient analysis. Advancements in the acquisition and dissemination of Earth observations, coupled with advances in cloud computing, web apps, online mapping, and visualization provide a unique opportunity to deliver tools and actionable information to groundwater managers to assist them in addressing global and regional challenges and opportunities. We have developed a web-based tool that ingests in situ groundwater level measurements for specific aquifers and generates time series plots, maps, and raster animations showing groundwater depletion over time and short-term projections into the future. This process involves both temporal and spatial interpolation algorithms. In some aquifers, the observation wells are sparse and/or the historical observations have large gaps, leading to greater uncertainty in the interpolation and the resulting groundwater depletion estimates. To address this, we utilize Earth observations (GRACE, SMAP, etc.) and a co-kriging algorithm to enhance the interpolation process. The utility of the Earth observations in improving the estimates is evaluated using a jackknifing process. We present case studies for application of the system in the states of Utah and Texas.