NEWS NOTES ON SUSTAINABLE WATER RESOURCESUSGS Data on Domestic Wellshttps://ca.water.usgs.gov/projects/USGS-US-domestic-wells.html“A new USGS ...
Published on by Tim Smith, Employee at Retiree & P/T Consultant
USGS Data on Domestic Wells
https://ca.water.usgs.gov/projects/USGS-US-domestic-wells.html
“A new USGS web page illustrates where domestic (private) wells are located and how many people are using them, based on the results of a 2019 USGS study. Nearly 40 million people in the United States rely on a domestic well for their drinking-water supply.”
“The geonarrative displays interactive maps that allow the user to view the number of people who rely on domestic wells per square kilometer and the number and percentage of people by state using domestic wells. Users can zoom in on any particular area, although the maps are not intended to be used at the scale of a single house.”
“The new research uses population data from the two most recent censuses (2000 and 2010) to project the population relying on domestic wells for the years 1990 to 2010. The 1990 census was the last nationally consistent survey of the source of drinking water to a home; subsequent census questionnaires did not request this information.”
“The number of people using domestic-well water in the contiguous U.S. is estimated to have increased 1.5% from 1990 to 2000 from 36.70 to 37.25 million people and to have increased slightly from 2000 to 2010 to 37.29 million people. Although the number of people has grown, as a percentage of the population it has decreased, from 16.4% in 1970 to an estimated 12.2% in 2010.”
“Knowing the location of domestic wells and the populations they serve can aid in optimizing groundwater-quality testing to help ensure safe drinking water in domestic wells nationwide. For instance, knowing where a high density of domestic well use overlies potentially corrosive groundwater could help focus water-quality testing for lead.”
More information on sustainable water resources is available at https://sites.google.com/site/sustainablewaterresources/