My colleague Mike Craun (PE) and I are members of the Charlottesville, Virginia-based Building Goodness Foundation (BGF).  BGF helps communities in need http://www.buildinggoodness.org/ through the building trades; building medical clinics, schools, community centers and housing.  BGS has assisted communities in Haiti, Guatemala, Honduras, Pearlington, Mississippi, the Mattaponi Indian Reservation in Virginia and numerous projects around the Charlottesville, Virginia region.

Recently, they have extended their assistance to Students Helping Honduras (SHH) http://www.studentshelpinghonduras.org/  SHH is helping a group of familes build 50 new homes in a new village (Villa Solleada) near El Progreso, Honduras.

Honduras is the poorest of all the countries of Central America.  In 1998 they were devastated by Hurricane Mitch which dumped records amount of rain in the mountains and eslsewhere.  There were devastating floods, landslides, and 7000 people died, 33,000 homes and 95 bridges were destroyed.

Mike and I will be volunteering our services in assessing the soil, geology and groundwater of the site to find appropriate solutions for sewage waste disposal and in developing a safe and sustainable drinking water resource.

We will be flying from Dulles Airport on December 3, 2008 toting as many tools as we can (water level meters, permeameters (to measure the hydraulic conductivity of the soil), hand augers, transits, etc).

Specifically, we plan to conduct an aquifer test on a recently installed well.  The information we can obtain from this activity will be allow us to design a groundwater withdrawal plan that is in equilibrium with the capabilities of the aquifer.  This will go a long way to ensure that that water system will last for many years without the fear of draining the water from the resource.

We also plan to shoot topo, conduct hydraulic conductivity tests on the soil, recon the drainage basin and adjacent and abutting properties,  test the drinking water supply for contaminants and meet with the members of the community to present our preliminary findings.

After some prodding by a very good friend,  I have decided to enter the "blogging"world by writing about what I know and what I do for a living and that is soil, geology, groundwater and environmental consulting.  

For the early stages I will focus on groundwater; specifically, groundwater in the crystalline piedmont of the east coast.  Where it comes from, where it resides, how it behaves, where to find it and how to use it in a sustainable manner.

Rather than get into the question(s) of why the earth has so much water, I will start with the fact that the oceans are the source for most of the water we find in the ground. 

This blog will focus on the water cycle and where the water is stored in crystalline and/or fractured bedrock aquifers.

The water cycle graphic below (thank you USGS) illustrates how this occurs:



Water is stored in the ocean and is evaporated by the sun and condenses into clouds which become saturated and release the moisture as rain or snow, or some form of precipitation.  The rain infiltrates the ground (recharge)and the pore spaces in the weathered material above the solid rock (the regolith) become filled.  A picture is worth a thousand words, the USGS graphic below illustrates it very well:




When the aquifer fills up, the water begins to flow from the ground into streams (discharge) as baseflow contributions. Heres a picture of a stream during normal baseflow periods (courtesy USGS):



When there is a drought, the aquifer (reservoir) begins to fall and the stream responds by dropping water levels (USGS):

 
For the purposes of this discussion, let's assume that the water level in the picture above is due to reduced baseflow contributions.....the aquifer is receding (verically) into the earth. 

Ok, that's it for today....I'm going to find out who our president is now.

Vludlow