Hydrogeology GLY414/415 Name:________________________

Homework 1 Lab Section (circle): Wed - Thu - Fri

Due Sept 9, 2013



1. The drainage area of the Colorado River is about 653,000 Km
2
and its average
annual discharge is about 15 million acre-feet (Manning, 1992). The average
precipitation rate in the basin is about 12 inches/year. Calculate the river discharge
divided by the drainage basin area in meters/year. What fraction of the annual
precipitation rate is this? What fates, other than ending up in the Colorado River,
can precipitated water have in this basin?


































2. Every summer you visit the same lake in Ohio, and every summer your neighbor
goes on and on about how the lake is spring-fed (groundwater discharge up into
the lake bottom). You wonder if that was true, so you collected all the information
you could from the local geological survey office about the lake hydrology for the
month of June:

The surface area of the lake is 289 acres.

There is one inlet stream. For the month of June, the total discharge measured at
the stream gage at the lake inlet was 2.4x10
7
ft
3
.

There is one outlet stream. For the month of June, the total discharge measured at
the stream gage at the lake outlet was 3.3x10
7
ft
3
.

During the month of June, the total precipitation measured in a rain gage at the
lakeshore was 2.63 inches.

Direct evaporation off the lake surface totaled 2 inches during the month of June.

The lake level dropped 3 inches during the month of June.

a. List the items that contribute flow to the lake and the items that contribute
flow out of the lake (there may be unknown items I have not listed above).
Write out an equation for the water balance of the lake in June.






b. Quantify each of the terms in the hydrologic equation in units of ft
3
for the
month of June, and solve for unknowns in the equation.







c. What, if anything can your conclude about the notion that the lake is spring-
fed?



3. You are given a data set that shows diurnal changes in the water table over a
five-day period. Your client wants to know the amount of amount of groundwater
that is removed from the system as a result of Evapotranspiration. Assume that
specific yield is 0.25.




a. Your client was not clear the exact time of day the x-axes represent. Based
on these data what time of day do the labels 1,2,3, etc represent?



b. Calculate ETG








c. What is happening on day 4 and 5?



0
2
4
6
8
10
12
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
W
a
t
e
r

L
e
v
e
l

(
c
m
)

Time (days)
Water Level Site 1

4. The following field notes were taken at a nest of piezometers installed side by
side at a single site.

Piezometer A B C
Elevation at
surface (masl)
450 450 450
Depth of
piezometer middle
of screen (m)
150 100 50
Depth to water (m) 27 47 36

Calculate the following:

A. The total hydraulic head at A, B, and C in meters.
B. The pressure head at A, B, and C in meters.
C. The elevation head at A, B, and C in meters.
D. The fluid pressure at B in N/m
2
.
E. Based on these head data water is flowing from A and B and between C and B.
Can you think of a hydrological situation that would lead to the direction of
flow indicated by these data?

























5 Calculate the total head, pressure head and elevation head for the following wells.


Well A Well B Well C Well D
Pressure head ()
Elevation head (z)
Total head (h)