VECTOR Systems Applications for Observing and Monitoring Groundwater-Surface Water Interactions

No longer can we assume that the surface environment merely recharges what lies beneath. The complex interplay between aquifer, river, and riparian ecosystem is only now coming to light. Understanding and monitoring the complex interaction of aquifer dynamics to surface water bodies, however, is requiring a new set of tools from space-borne remote sensors to complex computer models. Ironically, much of this new information serves us with a newer set of ever more sophisticated questions. VECTOR technology can help todays investigator answer fundamental hydrodynamical questions regarding the interplay between our surface and ground water resources. Long-term monitoring ability also means that VECTOR data can be integrated into GIS databases for comprehensive ecological monitoring. Here are just a few ways that VECTOR sensors may be used to better understand SWGW interactions:

• Monitor subsurface movement of polluted surface water bodies by tracking the ground water vector at a chemistry sampling point. Determine base, under, or mixed flow properties to trace contaminant origin or terminus.

• Characterize riparian-zone hydrologic processes and their effects on ground water flow vectors on various temporal scales.

• Quantify the contribution of fluvial morphology to changes in the subsurface flow vector without the use of tracers.

• Observe subsurface aquifer flow vector and temperature fluctuations from mobile GWSIs.

• Quantify the spatial and temporal relationship between infiltration and spikes in surface head as measured by flow vector anomalies.
  
  Directly measure and quantify the seasonal fluctuation of localized sediment-dependent flow vectors near specific river morphologies as a function of river stage or other environmental changes.
  
  Directly quantify vertical flow components without the use of extensive piezometer nests and their inherent potentially ambiguous results. Improve recharge parameters for wetlands restoration.

• Quantify directional transmissivities within individual sedimentary units without extensive piezometric networks and model calibration.

• Directly measure hydraulic anisotropy with a minimum of wells and without the estimation uncertainties of published hydraulic conductivity ranges.

• Monitor diurnal, seasonal, or other climate induced variations in hypohreic exchange and quantify hydraulic connectivity between surface water bodies and ground water.

• Better quantify contributions to the subsurface from perennial and intermittent streams versus areal recharge by coupling flow vector changes to climate and river stage data.

• Monitor subsurface effects on the flow vector caused by simple surface water body depletion.

• Observe and quantify effects of extreme climatic events on subsurface dynamics.
  

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