Status and Understanding of Groundwater Quality in the Sierra Nevada Regional Study Unit, 2008: California GAMA Priority Basin Project

Groundwater quality in the Sierra Nevada Regional (SNR) study unit was investigated as part of the California State Water Resources Control Board’s Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment Program Priority Basin Project. The study was designed to provide statistically unbiased assessments of the quality of untreated groundwater within the primary aquifer system of the Sierra Nevada.

The primary aquifer system for the SNR study unit was delineated by the depth intervals over which wells in the State of California’s database of public drinking-water supply wells are open or screened. Two types of assessments were made: (1) a status assessment that described the current quality of the groundwater resource, and (2) an evaluation of relations between groundwater quality and potential explanatory factors that represent characteristics of the primary aquifer system. The assessments characterize untreated groundwater quality, rather than the quality of treated drinking water delivered to consumers by water distributors.

The status assessment was based on water-quality data collected by the U.S. Geological Survey from 83 wells in the SNR study unit in 2008 and from 117 wells in 3 small study units within the SNR study unit in 2006–07 and on water-quality data compiled in the State’s database for 1,066 wells sampled in 2006–08.

To provide some context for the results, water-quality data were converted to relative-concentrations (RCs), which are the sample concentrations divided by the concentrations of Federal or California regulatory and non-regulatory benchmarks for drinking-water quality. RCs for inorganic constituents (major ions, trace elements, nutrients, and radioactive constituents) were classified as “high” (RC > 1.0, indicating that concentration is above the benchmark), “moderate” (1.0 ? RC > 0.5), or “low” (RC ? 0.5). For organic constituents (volatile organic compounds and pesticides) and special-interest constituents (perchlorate and N-nitrosodimethylamine [NDMA]), the boundary between moderate and low RCs was set at 0.1. All benchmarks used for organic constituents were health-based, whereas health-based and aesthetic-based benchmarks were used for inorganic constituents.

The primary metric used for quantifying regional-scale groundwater quality was “aquifer-scale proportion.” Aquifer-scale proportions were calculated as the areal percentages of the primary aquifer system having high, moderate, and low RCs for a given constituent or class of constituents. The SNR study unit area was classified into four aquifer lithologic types—granitic rocks, metamorphic rocks, sedimentary deposits, and volcanic rocks—and aquifer-scale proportions were calculated on an area-weighted basis for each of the four aquifer lithologies and for the study unit as a whole (aggregated system).