BOARD00363

• Board Meeting Date: 5/24/2004
• Description: Artificial Recharge of Ground Water in Colorado - A Statewide Assessment
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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Artificial Recharge of Ground Water in Colorado
A Statewide Assessment

use of an injection well completed in the Dakota sandstone at Lincoln for storage using water
pumped from the alluvial aquifer. It is not clear from the literature whether there are any
ongoing AR applications at this time in Nebraska.

New Jersey
The state of New Jersey has nine relatively new ASR projects (ASR Forum, 2004). The nation's
first ASR well, operating since the late 1960s, is located at the Wildwood site and is now part of
a system of four wells. New Jersey utilizes ASR to augment municipal water supplies during
periods of high demand.

New York
AR has been practiced on Long Island since the 1930s. To help replenish the aquifer, as well as
reduce urban flooding and control saltwater intrusion, more than 3,000 recharge basins dispose
of storm runoff at an average rate of about ISO million gallons per day. Initially, many of these
basins were abandoned gravel pits, but since 1936 urban planners require developers to construct
recharge basins with new developments. Practically all basins are unlined excavations in the
upper glacial deposits and have areas from less than 0.1 to more than 30 acres (Alley and others,
1999).

Nevada
The Southern Nevada Water Authority has been using ASR to augment water supply since 1988,
and is currently cycling 60,000 to 72,000 ac-ft per year. The program was also designed to
partially abate a severe ground subsidence problem that has existed in the Las Vegas Valley
because of excessive ground-water withdrawal over the past several decades.

Texas
Projects in Texas primarily conduct AR into unconsolidated to semi-consolidated basin-fill
aquifers. Municipalities appear to be the primary operators of recharge projects with the primary
objectives being disposal of treated wastewater and storage of excess seasonal surface-water
resources. Injection is the dominant recharge method being used and volumes range from 33 to
12,000 ac-ft per year. Several small ASR projects are scattered around Texas, including El Paso,
KerrviIle, and San Antonio.

INTERNATIONAL PROJECTS
The use of AR internationally is concentrated within developed countries in Europe, the Middle
East, and in the South Pacific. A representation of the international recharge projects reviewed
for this study is presented in figure V-2. A brief discussion of some of the more significant
international projects follows.

Australia
The literature documents several small ASR projects scattered around Australia. At the Andrews
Farm project, passively treated storm water is injected into a brackish aquifer to improve water
quality for irrigation (UNEP, 2004). At the Burdekin River Delta project, about 50 gallons per
minute (gpm) of water is pumped from Burdekin River to a distribution network of natural and
artificial channels for surface infiltration. The system is the primary water source for the highest
yielding sugarcane farm in Australia. In the town of Clayton, one ASR well injects storm water

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