Contributions to Death Valley Ground Water from Southeast California Desert Basins

Ground Water Contributions to Death Valley

from Southeast California Desert Basins

By

M. S. Bedinger

P.O. Box 790

Carlsborg, WA98324

and

J.R. Harrill

608 Highland Street

Carson City, NV, 89703

Hydrogeologic Consultants to the National Park Service

Transcript of the paper presented at the GSA 2003 Annual Meeting and Exposition, Seattle, Washington, November 2-5, 2003

Slides refer to the accompanying PowerPoint presentation of the same title

Slide 1: Introduction

Ground-water models of the Death Valley flow system have focused primarily on problems in Nevada. The inflow to Death Valley from the southeast California desert basins has been largely excluded from previous models. For the past few years Jim Harrill, my co-author in this paper, and I have been consultantsto the U. S. National Park Service on ground-water issues related to Death Valley. As a part of this work we are doing oversight of the USGS model of the Death Valley flow system. This paper is a brief summary of our work sponsored by the National Park Service for a quantitative appraisal of the ground-water flow to Death Valley from the California basins. The results of our study have been included in the current version of the Death Valley flow system model by the simulation of boundary flows.

Slide 2:Regional potential showing area of contribution to Death Valley

This map shows the extent of the Death Valley flow system of Nevada and California. The boundary of the Death Valley (DV) flow system is outlined by red. The DVRFS (Death Valley Regional Flow System) model boundary of the U. S. Geological Survey is shown by the yellow line. The gradients on the regional potentiometric surface, the blue contours, show the potential for inflow to Death Valley from the California basins.

Slide 3:Hydrogeologic Units

The outcrop of hydrogeologicunits is generalized from the state geologic map. The boundary of the Basin and Range is generally marked by the igneous rocks shown in red with the SierraNevadaon the west and San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains on the south. A divide on the potentiometric surface, shown in the previous slide, separates the Death Valley flow system and the Lower Colorado River flow system to the southeast. Basin fill is the predominant rock, yellow, in the area of study. The arcuate trace of the Garlock fault marks the line between the Mojave Desert and the Great Basin. We can discern a distinct change in out crop pattern and rock types between the two physiographic areas. Bedrock in the Mojave Desert is largely intrusive and metamorphic rocks with some volcanic rocks. The Great Basin contains a great amount of carbonate rocks some extensive areas of non-carbonate sedimentary rocks in addition to crystalline and volcanic rocks. The carbonate rocks make up the more significant bedrock aquifers. Permeability of bedrock is related to a large extent to fractures and faults with solution enhanced permeability zones in carbonate rocks.

Slide 4: Relief Map

The climate of the area is one of the most diverse in the country. Climate is largely controlled by elevation which has an extreme range from below sea level in Death Valley to 14,000 ft in the White Mountains. The region is basically a complex of rain shadow deserts. It exhibits severe conditions of winter cold at high elevations; and, great annual ranges in temperature occur throughout the area. Low elevations exhibit subtropical properties such as mild warm winters, great summer heat, and summer convectional rainfall (Rowlands, 1993).

Precipitation increases in proportion to elevation. We see from the relief map that the Great Basin portion of the area contains the higher mountain ranges; the higher elevations are in green and gray.

The Mojave Desert section, shown mostly in yellow and brown is generally below 4,000 ft in altitude.

Slide5: Regional Potential for Ground-Water Flow

This map shows the regional ground-water potential (blue lines) and the area contributing to Death Valley, outlined by red. The boundaries of the topographically closed basinsin southeastern Californiaare delineated by white lines. Ground-water evapotranspiration areas are shown in green.

Ground-water basins that have been studied in detail include the Mojave Basin (M), Indian Wells and SearlesBasins (IS) and Owens Valley (O). The basin fill and alluvial deposits in these basins make up the principal aquifers. Studies of these basins conclude that the bounding consolidated rock does not contribute significantly to the water supply of the basins.

Slide 6: Thermal Springs

Thermal springs, shown by the blue dots, are more common in the Great Basin part of the area. Thermal springs are commonly located near valley floors as indicated by their proximity to areas of evapotranspiration. These springs can provide us with inferences regarding ground-water flow in the consolidated rock including zones of permeability and depth of flow. Two areas of hydrothermal convective systems border the eastern flank of the Sierra Nevada, the Coso geothermal field (C) and the LongValley geothermal field (L), shown in light blue. These geothermal areas are high temperature systems in which water-steam transitions occur. These systems are associated with young volcanics.

The other hot springs in the Death Valley flow region are surface manifestations of hydraulically forced fluid convection of geothermal energy. The temperatures of hot springs are due to heating by the great geothermal heat flow of ground water circulating at depth.

Slide 7: Pluvial Drainage

A map of major surface water features that existed in southeastern California and adjacent parts of Nevadaduring the Pleistocene, with some Pliocene features included, are shown in this slide. Pluvial lakes are shown in dark blue. Marshes are shown in light blue. Death Valley, the ultimate destination of both surface and ground water, was beneficiary of alarge integrated surface-water drainage system.

The Pluvial drainage was marked by a chain of lakes along the flank of the Sierra Nevada, beginning at its maximum extent, with its headwaters at Mono Lake (M) and extending downstream through an integrated chain of lakes – Adobe Lake (A), Owens Lake (O), China Lake, Searles Lake (China and Searles Lakes merged at high stages to form one lake) (CS), Panamint Lake (P), and finally Lake Manly (ML) that occupied Death Valley.

A chain of lakes punctuated the MojaveRiver as it drained into Death Valley. Lake Manix (MX) occupied lowland of the MojaveRiver valley between present-day Barstow and AftonCanyon. Lake Mojave (MV) occupied the present day playas of SodaLake and SilverLake. Several Pleistocene lakes, without apparent connecting streams to the MojaveRiver, occupied shallow basins west and northwest of the MojaveRiver.

During the Pleistocene, the Amargosa River (AG) was, as it is today, a tributary to Death Valley. Lake Tecopa (T), named for its location near the town of that name, occupied the channel of the AmargosaRiverin the Pliocene. The basins of Pahrump (PR), Mesquite (MQ), and Ash Meadows (AM) did not hold lakes but were inferred to have been occupied by marshes of somewhat larger extent than the early settlers found when they entered the region.

Slides8 and 9:Contributing Ground-Water Basins

Basins bordering Death Valley in southeastern California that contribute the greater part of the California inflow to Death Valley are largely undeveloped for ground-water supplies.

Bordering Death Valleyto the northwest are Deep Springs, Eureka, Racetrack Playa and SalineValleys, all topographically closed basins. The bedrock is composed of granitic intrusions, Paleozoic carbonate, volcanic and clastic rocks. The water budget of these basins was made using the Maxey-Eakin method.

The balance of water, that is the recharge minus the ground-water loss by evapotranspiration, from these basins, plus the estimated inflow to the basins from OwensValley, isabout 13,000 m3d. The regional potentiometric map indicates that this flow would enter Death Valley largely from SalineValley with some inflow across the Eureka-DeathValley boundary.

PanamintValley, a closed topographic basin, lies along the western margin of Death Valley. PanamintValley is separated from Death Valley by the Panamint Range.

A reconnaissance water budget was made by Jim Harrill. The balance of ground water, 14,000 m3/d, is tributary to Death Valley.

PanamintValley also receives ground water by underflow from parts of Owens, Mojave, Indian Wells, and SearlesLakeValleys. The inflow from these basins is estimated by Darcy calculations to be less than 2,000 m3/d. PanamintValleyand the upgradient basins contribute an estimated flow to Death Valley of 16,000 m3d.

The contributing area to the southern part of Death Valley includesseveral basins. These basins for the most part are of elevations lower than 4,000 feet and receive less than 6 inches of precipitation per year. Recharge rates are very low. Most of the recharge to Valjean, ShadowMountain,Mesquite and SodaLakeValleysdischarge by evapotranspiration at Mesquite and SodaLakeValley playas. The ground-water gradient is parallel to much of the boundary between these basins and Death Valley. Most of the inflow to Death Valley as indicated by the regional potential is through the western part of this boundary segment. Darcy calculations show a flow of about 1,000 m3d to Death Valley.

In summary the contribution to Death Valley from the California basins is about 30,000m3/d. Most of this inflow is derived from recharge to the higher mountain ranges of Deep Springs, Eureka, Saline and PanamintValleys. The results of our study have been included in the current U. S. Geological Survey model of the Death Valley flow system by the simulation of boundary flows to the model.

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