Water Science Series- Screening Tool for Guiding Short-Term Groundwater Curtailment

This report describes a spreadsheet-based screening tool to support statutory decision makers and regional water managers for guiding groundwater curtailment and data collection activities. The screening tool is intended as a support tool that the decision maker may want to consider as part of their toolkit during times of scarcity. The spreadsheet calculates the curtailment envelope from the user specified pumping rates, distance between the well and the stream, and the aquifer hydraulic properties. The calculations are based on a number of simplifying assumptions about the aquifer-stream system. The screening tool can be used to help prioritize drought planning, data collection efforts, and curtailment evaluation to those wells within the curtailment envelope, while committing less resources to wells that are outside of the envelope.