Groundwater is one of the earth’s most important natural resources. Groundwater is water stored in rock, sand, or gravel pores underneath the earth’s surface. The areas which hold groundwater are called aquifers. Groundwater makes up approximately 40% of the public and agricultural water supply. It is typically accessed through pumps and wells. It is crucial that we monitor changes in groundwater levels as depletion of groundwater resources would be detrimental.
I have focused my research on the four aquifers which reside within the Denver Basin: Dawson Aquifer, Denver Aquifer, Arapahoe Aquifer, and Laramie-Fox Hills Aquifer. I gathered and analyzed all well data which had been collected for the Denver Basin area. Some wells had data going back more than 50 years, while others only a year or two. With the data, I have developed a set of rasters for each aquifer showing groundwater levels with an interpolated surface. I have developed an average groundwater level raster, a current groundwater level raster, and a 10-year-old groundwater level raster.
The values in my interpolation represent the depth to water level measurements. This is the space between the surface and the water table. As this value increases, it demonstrates a depletion of the aquifer. I hypothesized that the rasters will visually demonstrate groundwater depletion when comparing the 10 year and present interpolation.
Changes can be observed between the 10 year-old, average, and most recent interpolation of groundwater. However, these changes do not necessarily demonstrate a strong trend. The ten year raster shows slight depletion in comparison to the average just like the recent raster. The depletion seems to be minimal, however. More data would need to be collected at well sites for a longer period to truly extrapolate a trend.