Ground‐Water Chemical Quality Management by Artificial Rechargea

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Abstract
The effectiveness of basin ground‐water recharge at the Leaky Acres Recharge Facility in Fresno, California for improving the regional ground‐water quality was studied as 65,815,000 m3 of high‐quality surface water was recharged from 1971 through 1975. Observation wells at the facility showed some variability in chemical parameters associated with each recharge period. The long‐term decreases in salinity could be described by a power law decay curve fitted by regression analysis.Without a special network of observation wells outside the facility, scientific evaluation of the enclave of recharged water is not possible. A practical evaluation of water‐quality changes is possible from producing water wells around the facility. However, the pumping well discharge‐time variations, well depth, aquifer sequence, and prior use of surrounding land must be considered, since all of these factors affect the pumped‐water quality and its seasonal variability. Recharge at Leaky Acres had noticeably decreased the ground‐water salinity for a distance of up to 1.6 km in the direction of the regional ground‐water movement.