Watershed Water Budgets for Managing Minnesota's Groundwater

Effective groundwater management requires accurate knowledge about the water budget, which is the amount of water stored within the system in aquifers and the amount of water flowing through the overall hydrologic system including water flowing at the surface, water flowing from above ground down into aquifers, and water flowing between aquifers below the surface. While groundwater storage can be generally well understood and there is good knowledge about surface water flow, there is not usually a strong understanding about the water flowing down from the surface to aquifers and below the surface between different aquifers. The United States Geological Survey is using this appropriation to pilot a method intended to better calculate the groundwater flow component of the hydrologic system in order to provide information that will improve knowledge about water sustainability and the interaction between surface and ground water. The method will be piloted in watersheds in St. Louis and Goodhue counties.