Spatio-Temporal Variation in the Isotopic Composition of the Tap Water in the Salt Lake Valley
Location
Eccles Conference Center Auditorium
Event Website
http://water.usu.edu
Start Date
3-31-2015 11:10 AM
End Date
3-31-2015 11:20 AM
Description
Water extraction for human use has become a major flux in the hydrological cycle. Water use in urban areas alters energy balance, including latent heat flux and surface albedo, ecology, hydrology, and biogeochemical cycling within cities. The severity of these effects, and the need to better understand connections between climate, water extraction, water use, and water use impacts, is strongest in areas of climatic aridity and substantial land-use change, such as the rapidly urbanizing areas of Utah that constitute the focus of the iUTAH program. With support from iUTAH our group has helped to generate and analyze stable water isotope data from a series of bi-annual hydrological surveys (spring and fall, 2013 and 2014) in urban tap waters across the Salt Lake Valley. Our data from the Salt Lake Valley tap water survey shows temporal and spatial variation among the different water districts across the valley. The water data clustered into 4 groups with sites having similar water isotopic composition clustering in a single group. Whereas some groups have similar isotopic values for both the seasons (spring and fall), other groups show seasonal variation in their isotopic composition. In general, tap water sites within a water district have similar isotopic composition and are grouped in the same cluster except for West valley and Salt Lake City water districts where the sites within the districts showed contrasting isotopic composition and were clustered in two different groups. We observe strong north-south trend among the water districts and the average isotopic composition of tap water being lighter in the districts on the northern and the eastern sides of the valley compared to the districts on the western and southern sides. Seasonal variations are also observed in the isotopic composition of the tap water for the water districts, all the water districts show isotopic enrichment in the fall except for 3 districts in the eastern side of the valley where the seasonal variation between the spring and fall tap water composition is insignificant. The isotopic composition of tap water renders important information on the pattern of water extraction and usage, relate waters sampled at the point of use to environmental or meteoric sources, and quantify isotopic budgets that may provide insight into otherwise obscure fluxes within the regional water cycle (e.g., reservoir evaporation, leakage from infrastructure). Our analysis suggests presence of multiple sources of water being used to serve the valley’s population. The tap water in spring is dominantly surface water derived from the rivers and creeks in the Wasatch Mountains whereas the fall tap water reflects either the isotopic enrichment of source water due to evaporation, change in the source of water for some districts from surface water to groundwater and blending of water from different sources in large districts such as SLC and West Valley. . Our results show the connections between climatic sources of water and municipal water use, evaporative losses from regional water management systems and spatiotemporal patterns in many of these characteristics across water management districts.
Spatio-Temporal Variation in the Isotopic Composition of the Tap Water in the Salt Lake Valley
Eccles Conference Center Auditorium
Water extraction for human use has become a major flux in the hydrological cycle. Water use in urban areas alters energy balance, including latent heat flux and surface albedo, ecology, hydrology, and biogeochemical cycling within cities. The severity of these effects, and the need to better understand connections between climate, water extraction, water use, and water use impacts, is strongest in areas of climatic aridity and substantial land-use change, such as the rapidly urbanizing areas of Utah that constitute the focus of the iUTAH program. With support from iUTAH our group has helped to generate and analyze stable water isotope data from a series of bi-annual hydrological surveys (spring and fall, 2013 and 2014) in urban tap waters across the Salt Lake Valley. Our data from the Salt Lake Valley tap water survey shows temporal and spatial variation among the different water districts across the valley. The water data clustered into 4 groups with sites having similar water isotopic composition clustering in a single group. Whereas some groups have similar isotopic values for both the seasons (spring and fall), other groups show seasonal variation in their isotopic composition. In general, tap water sites within a water district have similar isotopic composition and are grouped in the same cluster except for West valley and Salt Lake City water districts where the sites within the districts showed contrasting isotopic composition and were clustered in two different groups. We observe strong north-south trend among the water districts and the average isotopic composition of tap water being lighter in the districts on the northern and the eastern sides of the valley compared to the districts on the western and southern sides. Seasonal variations are also observed in the isotopic composition of the tap water for the water districts, all the water districts show isotopic enrichment in the fall except for 3 districts in the eastern side of the valley where the seasonal variation between the spring and fall tap water composition is insignificant. The isotopic composition of tap water renders important information on the pattern of water extraction and usage, relate waters sampled at the point of use to environmental or meteoric sources, and quantify isotopic budgets that may provide insight into otherwise obscure fluxes within the regional water cycle (e.g., reservoir evaporation, leakage from infrastructure). Our analysis suggests presence of multiple sources of water being used to serve the valley’s population. The tap water in spring is dominantly surface water derived from the rivers and creeks in the Wasatch Mountains whereas the fall tap water reflects either the isotopic enrichment of source water due to evaporation, change in the source of water for some districts from surface water to groundwater and blending of water from different sources in large districts such as SLC and West Valley. . Our results show the connections between climatic sources of water and municipal water use, evaporative losses from regional water management systems and spatiotemporal patterns in many of these characteristics across water management districts.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/runoff/2015/2015Posters/20