Improvement of Field and Laboratory Instrumentation for Environmental Hydrogeology

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Undergraduate environmental education for students majoring in hydrology, other environmental science and engineering disciplines should be centered around practical applications. Students must understand the critical scientific and engineering issues and become proficient in solving multidisciplinary problems using high-technology tools. The department is significantly improving existing field and analytical facilities to provide such tools to undergraduate students from several departments. Faculty have taught undergraduate environmental courses with laboratory components, in which the practical aspects of environmental science and engineering were emphasized. This project provides for the field equipment needed to improve the current disciplinary laboratory courses and to initiate new multidisciplinary courses that aim to develop in students the ability to integrate knowledge across traditional disciplines. The facility consists of a field site equipped with pumping/injecting wells, monitoring wells, and related monitoring equipment such as pressure transducers, a time domain reflectometry unit, tensiometers, suction lysimeters, a Wellmac logging system, and combination gamma/resistivity/temperature probe. Field experiments deal with water flow, water resources evaluation, water chemistry and quality, and geophysical methods. The following courses are using the field and laboratory facilities: hydrogeology, subsurface hydrology, water chemistry, vadose zone monitoring methods, vadose zone hydrology, groundwater resources evaluation, well logging, and environmental monitoring.