2012 News Releases

• News Release, August 14, 2012
  New Flood Mapping Tool Helps Prepare Suncook Area for Future Floods

  A new flood preparedness tool that will help emergency managers improve flood warnings and response is now available for a 16.5-mile reach of the Suncook River in southeastern New Hampshire that has frequently flooded adjacent homes. The new web-based tool, developed by U.S. Geological Survey scientists, shows flood inundation maps to identify where the potential threat of floodwaters is greatest.

  • Read the entire News Release
  • Go to Flood Inundation Mapper

   

• News Release, July 23, 2012
  New Maps for New England

  Nearly 690 revised digital maps covering Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont have been added to approximately 51,000 maps currently covering the lower 48 states and are available for free download from the website.
  
  
  

• News Release, June 25, 2012
  Study Confirms Presence of Contaminants in Some New England Bedrock Groundwater, ID's New Concerns, Determines Likely Locations

  PEMBROKE, NH – Potentially harmful levels of naturally occurring arsenic, uranium, radium, radon and manganese have been found in some bedrock groundwater that supplies drinking water wells in New England, according to a new U.S. Geological Survey study.

  
  

• News Release, April 11, 2012
  New Geologic Map of Vermont Unveiled

  MONTPELIER, Vt. – A new bedrock geologic map of the state was unveiled in a ceremony at the Vermont State House today, bringing a critical tool to land managers involved in natural resource planning and environmental assessment.
  
  
  

• NEW WEB PAGE (4/20/2012):
  New Hampshire and Vermont Drought Watch (maps and information from USGS Drought Watch)

• EVENT: Friday, March 23, 2012, at Plymouth State University, Plymouth, NH
  2012 NH Water and Watershed Conference

  This is a one day conference for scientists, educators, students, volunteers, consultants, planners, and researchers alike. Check out the Conference Website at: http://www.plymouth.edu/center-for-the-environment/2012-nh-water-watershed-conference/ for more details, the agenda and registration..
  

• 2/21/2012
  Funding Secured for USGS Lake Champlain Streamflow and Lake Level Gages

  Data collection at 19 streamflow and lake-levels gages in the Lake Champlain Basin will continue until September 30, 2012 due to a combination of funding from the Lake Champlain Basin Program and the USGS. This funding averts a planned shutdown of the gages (see other 2011 news) that was scheduled for March 1.

  Those with questions concerning the continued operation of these streamgages should contact Keith Robinson of the USGS New Hampshire-Vermont Water Science Center at 603-226-7807 or dc_nh@usgs.gov.
  
  

2011 News Releases

• News Release, September 6, 2011
  New Science to Help Direct Action on Excessive Nutrients in Rivers and Estuaries
  
  

  New USGS findings released in the Journal of the American Water Resources Association are accessible at: http://water.usgs.gov/nawqa/sparrow/mrb/

  New Science to Help Water Managers Target Areas to Improve Water Quality—New SPAtially Referenced Regression On Watershed attributes (SPARROW) models were developed for seven major regions of the conterminous U.S. Regional total phosphorus and total nitrogen models were developed for six regions: New England and Mid-Atlantic; South Atlantic-Gulf and Tennessee; Great Lakes, Ohio, Upper Mississippi, and Souris-Red-Rainy; Missouri; Lower Mississippi, Arkansas-White-Red and Texas Gulf; and Pacific Northwest. A dissolved solids model was developed for the arid southwest.

  These models confirm the importance of urban and agricultural sources as major contributors of nutrients to streams, but provide new information about local and regional differences in nutrient contributions from contrasting types of agricultural (farm fertilizers vs. animal manure) and urban (wastewater vs diffuse runoff from developed land) sources. In some locations, diffuse background sources are a dominant source of nutrients to streams. Information on background sources is often difficult to quantify in local water-quality assessments, yet is needed to develop comprehensive and realistic management goals.

  An online, interactive decision support system provides easy access to these newly-developed regional models describing how rivers receive and transport nutrients from natural and human sources to sensitive waters, such as the Gulf of Mexico. In the arid southwest, the system can be used to delineate sources and transport of dissolved solids.

  
  

• News Release, August 30, 2011
  Arsenic, Uranium and Other Trace Elements, a Potential Concern in Private Drinking Wells
  
  The occurrence of trace elements in groundwater are widespread across the United States. Their patterns of occurrence, as well as exceedences of human health benchmarks, relate to factors associated with sources of trace elements and to features that affect their mobility. In general, cationic elements, such as manganese, are more common in groundwater in the humid east (see map), whereas oxyanion-forming elements, such as arsenic, are more commonly found in groundwater in the drier western United States. Approximately 19% of untreated water samples from 5,183 wells nation-wide contain concentrations of at least one trace element that exceeds a human health benchmark. Several trace elements commonly co-occur in groundwater. Of the wells with one or more trace elements exceeding human health benchmarks, about 10 percent had two or more trace elements (mostly combinations of arsenic, manganese, and uranium) at concentrations exceeding benchmarks.
  
  The news release can be accessed at: http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2914
  The full study and findings can be accessed at: http://water.usgs.gov/nawqa/trace/pubs/sir2011-5059
  Environmental Health News article about the report: It's elemental: Many private wells across U.S. are contaminated with arsenice and other elements

• UPDATED 10/4/2011:
  Status of USGS Lake Champlain Hydrologic Data Collection and Studies

  Data collection at multiple streamgages in the Lake Champlain Basin will continue until March 1, 2012, but may be discontinued after that date due to a lack of funding for the operation and maintenance of the streamgages. For a complete list of these threatened streamgages, see our real-time water data page. USGS continues to have discussions with our partners and cooperators in Vermont to find funding for the streamgages. USGS hydrologic investigations studying how water-quality conditions are changing in major tributaries to Lake Champlain, and the effectiveness of non-point source controls in the Englesby Brook watershed in Burlington VT, may also be affected.
  

• September 9, 2011
  High Flows in New Hampshire and Vermont from Tropical Storm Irene Estimated
  

• UPDATED 8/30/2011 (first posted 5/25/2011):
  Status of USGS Lake Champlain Hydrologic Data Collection and Studies

• May 5, 2011
  A new web site is now available with summaries and data tables from the New Hampshire and Vermont studies estimating water use for 2005

• February 15, 2011 Notice:
  USGS Lake Champlain Hydrologic Data Collection and Studies