The Delaware Geological Survey (DGS) at the University of Delaware has signed an agreement with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to become a data provider for the National Ground-Water Monitoring Network (NGWMN). NGWMN is a consortium of state and local agencies and the USGS that was established in 2013 to create a single point of access for scientists, engineers, policy makers, and the public to view and acquire important physical and chemical data on the nation’s groundwater resources. The network will ultimately allow users to view groundwater data across state lines to observe trends in groundwater quality and availability in a local, regional or national context. NGWMN resources are managed by the USGS Center for Data Analytics and can be accessed at http://cida.usgs.gov/ngwmn/.

The NGWMN is a product of the Subcommitte on Ground Water (SOGW), a subcommittee of the Federal Advisory Committee on Water Information (ACWI; http://acwi.gov). “Joining the NGWMN is culmination of hard work put in by the DGS. DGS scientists have participated since the beginning of this national effort, as well as contributed to the development of the Framework Report that outlines well network development, field practices, data management, and implementation” stated Dr. David Wunsch, Director of the DGS and State Geologist, who is also a member of ACWI and one of the founding members of the SOGW.

DGS staff members Scott Andres, Changming He, Tom McKenna, John Callahan, and David Wunsch will be working over the next several months to select wells and groundwater level and quality data to be included in the NGWMN and to establish the computing infrastructure to automatically provide data to the NGWMN data portal system. “This work takes advantage of data generated by existing DGS groundwater monitoring programs and expands accessibility to the information to a wider audience” explained Scott Andres.