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Estimated Annual Recharge to the Edwards Aquifer in the San Antonio Area, by Stream Basin or Ungaged Area, 1934–2016

Metadata Updated: July 6, 2024

The Edwards aquifer in south central Texas is one of the most permeable and productive aquifers in the United States and is the major source of public water supply for Bexar, Comal, Hays, Medina, and Uvalde Counties. The Edwards aquifer also supplies large quantities of water to agriculture, business, and industry in the region. The major artesian springs of the Edwards aquifer provide water for recreational activities, businesses, and downstream users, and provide habitat for several threatened or endangered species. The areas pertinent to the recharge process are the catchment area and the recharge zone. The catchment area consists of the parts of stream basins upstream from the recharge zone. Streams in the catchment area generally gain water (hence the term "catchment area") as they flow toward the recharge zone. As the streams flow across the recharge zone, which is essentially the outcrop of the Edwards aquifer, they lose substantial amounts of water through infiltration into the highly permeable, faulted and fractured rocks of the outcrop. Direct infiltration of rainfall also occurs in the interstream areas of the recharge zone. Annual recharge estimates are based on data collected from a network of U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) streamflow-gaging stations at sites upstream and downstream from the recharge zone and on assumptions related to applying runoff characteristics from gaged areas to ungaged areas (Puente, 1978). Runoff is affected by the distribution of rainfall, which historically has been estimated from a network of rain gages, some operated by the USGS, some by the Edwards Aquifer Authority (EAA), and some by the National Weather Service. Since 2004, the distribution of rainfall has been estimated from calibrated NEXRAD (NEXt-generation weather RADar) data provided by the EAA. The annual estimation of recharge to the Edwards aquifer is part of a continuing program of the USGS in cooperation with the EAA. This data release is formatted as a tab-delimited file (.txt) that contains the estimated annual recharge to the Edwards Aquifer for the years 1934 through 2016. The estimated annual recharge is divided into eight major river basins of the catchment area and for some of those basins, will also include estimates of recharge from adjacent ungaged areas.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date June 1, 2023
Metadata Updated Date July 6, 2024

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI EDI

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date June 1, 2023
Metadata Updated Date July 6, 2024
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
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Identifier USGS:58b8a643e4b01ccd5500c590
Data Last Modified 20200827
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://datainventory.doi.gov/data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
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Harvest Source Id 52bfcc16-6e15-478f-809a-b1bc76f1aeda
Harvest Source Title DOI EDI
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -100.47,29.17,-97.79,30.14
Publisher Hierarchy White House > U.S. Department of the Interior > U.S. Geological Survey
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 4e944e2de09438e9078247dd2cb910256ea33398f36b9dbd4ed8c579504b723c
Source Schema Version 1.1
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