ALBERT

Notes: Increased activity in the fields of ground-water geology and hydrology has focused attention on the academic preparations required of a geologist or engineer planning to enter the field of ground water. In an effort to improve understanding of the educational facilities available in the United States and Canada, the Research Committee of the Technical Division of the National Water Well Association is periodically inquiring into the status of these facilities.To arrive at a better understanding of the formal course work in ground water, a seven-item questionnaire was circulated to appropriate educational institutions in May 1960. A report, “Educational and Academic Research Facilities in Ground-Water Geology and Hydrology in the United States and Canada”, was published in May 1961 summarizing the information obtained from returned questionnaires. A similar survey was made in May 1963 to obtain data on advancements in educational facilities in ground water since 1960.This report, a contribution of the Technical Division of NWWA, is based on questionnaires completed in 1963 and provides statistical data on university and college facilities in the field of ground water. Detailed information is presented on 1) course work, 2) textbooks, 3) degrees granted, 4) descriptions of departments offering course work, 5) course instructors and 6) student training and employment. Recent advancements in educational facilities are summarized. It is hoped that the statistical and descriptive information embodied in this report will provide a suitable background for those who wish to assess the adequacy of available educational facilities in ground-water geology and hydrology.

Notes: This paper describes the new percussion-reverse circulation system, designed and developed in Italy for water-well drilling. In a special reverse circulation rig, the percussion bit, consisting of a tube with external welded blades, slides up and down on the outside of the hollow drill pipes, while the hollow drill pipes remain still. The field of application of the reverse circulation method is thus enormously enlarged; either hard, cemented formations or soft, unconsolidated deposits, as well as big boulders of any size are bored much faster and more efficiently than with any other method of drilling, provided that a sufficient source of water is available.

Notes: My subject does not deal directly with either wells or ground water - it does report to you the present (October, 1963) status of construction of one of the world's greatest projects in water resource development. What is the California State Water Project? What areas will it serve? What progress is being made? The answers are the story told in this paper.The magnitude of the project is measured in terms of quantity of water, money and time. The amount of water is four million acre-feet, estimated to meet the needs of the deficient areas it will serve until at least 1990. The cost is $1,750,000,000. The time is nine years from now to begin the delivery of water to the southernmost communities on the State's system.

Notes: Predictions of where and how a fluid waste may travel from disposal site to the water table require detailed information on the physical characteristics, location, and extent of all pervious and impervious materials in the unsaturated zone. Principles concerning the flow system in the unsaturated zone indicate the importance of choice of disposal technique in predicting the time required for the fluid waste to traverse the distance to the water table. With appropriate data on the location, extent, and physical properties of water-bearing materials and on the boundaries of the saturated zone flow system, it is possible to analyze the relative merits of a variety of waste disposal techniques and to describe the probable consequences of each. Environments of consolidated rocks, such as granites, sandstones, and limestones, pose problems in addition to those related to unconsolidated or granular porous media in defining the fluid-flow regimes that involve joint patterns, fracture patterns, solutional openings, and the rock structure.The consequences of ground-water contamination can be just as damaging to water users as the pollution of surface streams. In fact it can be argued that the consequences are far more damaging because they persist over much longer periods of time after the contaminating source has been eliminated. It would appear prudent, therefore, to guard against contamination of the ground-water resource in the first instance, rather than to engage in long expensive rehabilitation measures after the damage has been done.In 1960 Graham Walton presented data concerning contamination, by sewage or other man-made wastes, of surface and underground waters. The circumstances attending the reported incidents of contamination, especially those involving ground-water supplies, have aided materially in the choice of a few principles and ideas that will identify the role of some significant hydrologic factors in the underground movement of fluid wastes.Walton's discussion of ground-water contamination refers often to physical settings into which fluid wastes are discharged at or near the land surface into cesspools, tile-drain fields, and holding ponds. Furthermore, most reported instances of ground-water contamination have taken place in relatively humid

Notes: Future water-level declines in deep sandstone wells penetrating the Cambrian-Ordovician Aquifer, the most highly developed aquifer for large ground-water supplies in the Chicago region, are considered. The Cambrian-Ordovician Aquifer is encountered at an average depth of about 500 feet below the land surface at Chicago; it has an average thickness of 1000 feet and is composed chiefly of sandstones and dolomites. Recharge is received from overlying glacial deposits in areas averaging 47 miles west of Chicago and from leakage through a shale confining bed.Geohydrologic conditions are simulated by a model aquifer, i. e., a semi-infinite rectilinear strip of sandstones and dolomites 84 miles wide and 1000 feet thick. The model aquifer is bounded by a recharge boundary 47 miles west of Chicago and by two intersecting barrier boundaries 37 miles east and 60 miles south of Chicago, and is overlain by a confining bed consisting mostly of shale averaging 200 feet thick. The hydraulic properties of the model aquifer and its confining bed, the image-well theory, and appropriate ground-water formulas are used to construct a mathematical model which provides a means of evaluating the practical sustained yield of the aquifer and predicting future water-level declines. Records of past pumpage and water levels establish the validity of this mechanism as a model of the response of the aquifer to heavy pumping.Pumpage from deep sandstone wells concentrated in six pumping centers has increased from 200,000 gallons per day (gpd) in 1864 to 96.5 millions of gallons per day (mgd) in 1961. As a result of heavy pumping, water levels in deep sandstone wells declined more than 650 feet at Chicago between 1864 and 1961.The maximum amount of water that can be continually withdrawn from existing pumping centers without creating critical water levels or exceeding recharge is estimated to be about 46 mgd. Withdrawals from the Cambrian-Ordovician Aquifer have exceeded the practical sustained yield since 1959. It is estimated that about 65 mgd could be obtained by shifting one existing pumping center toward the west and by adding 2 new pumping centers north and northwest of Chicago.Unless lake water is made available to those areas with short supply a pumpage increase from 96.5 mgd in 1961 to 243 mgd in 2010 can be expected. Using this pumpage increase and taking into consideration dewatering of portions of upper units of the aquifer, declines in nonpumping water levels that may be expected between 1963 and 2010 at existing pumping centers were computed by using the mathematical model.Pumping water levels in most pumping centers will be at critical stages a few feet above the top of the lowermost and most productive unit of the aquifer by 2010.

Notes: In this paper geophysical techniques, as used in ground-water exploration are subdivided into “bore-hole” and “surface” methods. The former include the commonly used electrical and gamma-ray logging and the less commonly used hole calipering and current meter logging. Also included with this classification, but important enough to be considered separately, is the field of water-level measurements. The surface techniques discussed include electrical resistivity and refraction seismograph exploration.Because of the type of data which they yield the surface methods are most economical where much area is to be explored and large quantities of water are needed. These factors limit the use of the techniques by small water well contractors in domestic water well work. These same contractors, on the other hand, can gain real economic advantages, in many cases, by use of one or more of the bore-hole methods.Geophysical methods properly used can do much to guide the water well contractor. It is extremely important, however, that their use be carefully directed because in the past, where geophysical methods have failed, it has often been due to the incorrect application of the technique, rather than a failure of the technique.

Notes: The upper 350 to 400 feet of rocks underlying Lake County, Indiana, form a single but complex hydrologic system. The rock units composing this system consist (in ascending order) of dolomite, clay till (unit 4), glaciofluvial sand (unit 3), clay till (unit 2), and lacustrine sand, silt, and clay (unit 1). The dolomite and unit 3 form the principal aquifers and the clay tills, units 4 and 2, the confining layers.The geohydrology of the confining layers controls to a large extent the rate at which the aquifers are recharged from local precipitation and, thereby, their potential yield. Unit 4, the dolomite's confining layer, has an estimated average vertical permeability of about 0.003 gpd (gallon per day) per square foot. Under present conditions of head difference, the rate of recharge to the dolomite through unit 4 is estimated to average 20,000 gpd per square mile. Unit 2, the confining layer for unit 3, has an average estimated vertical permeability of about 0.007 gpd per square foot. Under present conditions of head difference the recharge through unit 3's confining layer is estimated to average about 100,000 gpd per square mile. However, these rates of recharge can be expected to increase as the head difference across each confining layer increases with extensive development of the aquifer.

Notes: Saline waters usually are more corrosive to metals than ordinary fresh waters. To predict whether saline ground water will be corrosive to steel, it is necessary to understand the effect of such factors as: (1) the salt content, (2) the dissolved gases, (3) the pH, (4) the temperature, and (5) the tendency to form mineral scale. If the water contains several thousand parts per million of sodium and other chlorides, it is likely to attack many metals, particularly steel and low-alloy steels. Stainless steels, copper alloys, aluminum alloys, and some nickel-base alloys also may be attacked, depending on conditions.Of the dissolved gases, oxygen is most important. The higher the oxygen content the more corrosive the saline water, particularly to steel. On the other hand, high-oxygen content tends to promote passivation of aluminum and stainless steels. If the saline water is acid (with a pH well below 5), direct attack of the metal accompanied by hydrogen evolution may be expected. Under these conditions, the rate of attack often is very rapid and oxygen is not needed for the corrosion reaction.As the temperature is increased, the corrosion rate usually is accelerated. However, if one considers a saline water at atmospheric pressure, an increase in temperature will reduce the oxygen solubility. It has been observed that high-temperature brines from anaerobic wells usually do not corrode steel. Also metastable waters, containing calcium and magnesium salts, may form mineral scale upon being heated. This scale, if it forms a tight coating, slows down or stops corrosion. Galvanic couples in equipment such as valves, pumps, screens, and well fittings in general, often are a serious corrosion problem in practice.It is recommended that pilot corrosion studies be made of candidate designs in a specific ground water at the pressure and temperature which exists in service. Many saline waters, particularly those containing oxygen, are found corrosive to common metals. Some of the factors which influence corrosion are described.