Promoting Resilient Groundwater Resources and Holistic Watershed Management in the Southern Kenai Lowlands - NERRS/NSC(NERRS Science Collaborative)

This project takes existing spatial data sets, modeling frameworks, and local expertise, and integrates them with new science aimed at developing a comprehensive conceptual model and validated geospatial layer that can be used to predict specific locations where groundwater discharge and recharge occur. Working collaboratively with key end users who participated in the climate adaptation project, and with additional end users identified through the Kachemak Bay Reserve’s Community Council, the project team will interpret the groundwater model for use in land use planning, permitting, policy decisions, and habitat protection.

In 2016, the Kachemak Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve hosted a workshop series to develop strategies for coping with coastal climate change on the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska. The workshops were the result of a Science Collaborative Science Transfer grant, as well as involvement in the Successful Adaptation Indicators and Metrics Science Collaborative project.

Through the workshops, scientists, agency resource planners and regulators, conservation non-profits, tribal members, and community leaders were brought together to share ideas about what a thriving Kachemak Bay community might look like, and to explore how climate and environmental changes may affect the future. Participants also identified strategies and actions needed for building more resilient communities, and linked these to local efforts to move adaptive planning forward in the area. Resource planners, regulators, NOAA scientists, and Kachemak Bay reserve staff identified the critical need for information on groundwater flows that could be used in decision making. As a result of these workshops, the Kachemak Bay Reserve identified classifying and mapping groundwater discharge and recharge areas as a top priority, contributing to reserve efforts to lead ecosystem service valuation and climate change adaptation efforts.

Project Lead

Coowe Walker

Kachemak Bay National Estuarine

Research Reserve

(907) 235-4792

Cmwalker9@alaska.edu

==About this resource

The geodatabase offers a foundation for decision-making around groundwater in Alaska’s Kenai Lowlands. It can be used to show the depth and location of aquifers and predict groundwater discharge to streams. This information can help create vulnerability maps to show where human activities have the highest impact on aquifers and to identify locations where impacts would be less.

The geodatabase was created using available data to map factors that reveal where groundwater is located or that impact groundwater discharge. It contains 12 geospatial data layers related to climate, geological and topographical factors, vegetation, stream solute concentrations and temperatures, human impacts, and water supply well locations. Well Log Tracking System data were used to delineate watersheds and identify where seeps and springs (i.e., groundwater discharge) are likely to occur. The model was validated by field observations and optimized to show both shallow hillslope groundwater discharge (released to streams and wetlands over weeks to months) and deeper groundwater flows (released to the surface over years to decades).

The geodatabase is expected to be available in 2021, hosted at the University of Alaska Achorage Alaska Center for Conservation Science website.

In the meantime, for questions or to request access to the geodatabase, contact:

Coowe Walker, Kachemak Bay NERR, cmwalker9@alaska.edu

The distributor does not assume liability.

None

Cite this dataset when used as a source: NOAA retains the right to analyze, synthesize and publish summaries of the NERRS/NSC data. The NERRS/NSC retains the right to be fully credited for having collected and process the data. Following academic courtesy standards, the NERR site where the data were collected should be contacted and fully acknowledged in any subsequent publications in which any part of the data are used. The data enclosed within this package/transmission are only as accurate as the quality assurance and quality control procedures that are described in the associated metadata reporting statement allow. The user bears all responsibility for its subsequent use/misuse in any further analyses or comparisons. The Federal government does not assume liability to the Recipient or third persons, nor will the Federal government reimburse or indemnify the Recipient for its liability due to any losses resulting in any way from the use of this data. Requested citation format: NOAA National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS) Science Collaborative(NSC).

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This information is detailed within the project links.

This information is detailed within the project links.