Members ATtendance

v     
VISITORS:  John Bush, UI Professor Geological Sciences; Nancy Chaney, Moscow City Council; Scotty Cornelius, Interested citizen Whitman County; Kent Keller, WSU Professor hydrogeology; Cheryl Morgan, WRIA 34 Planning Unit; John Simler, Latah County Planning; Carl Thompson, City of Colfax, sitting in for Emily Adams.

 

1)      Call to Order and Approval of April 15, 2004 Minutes
Rob Corcoran, the PBAC Chair, called the meeting to order at 2:34 PM.  The minutes of the April 15, 2004 meeting were approved by consensus with one correction in wording.

2)      Palouse Basin Geological Maps of Whitman County – John Bush
Professor John Bush presented to PBAC draft versions of his three new 7.5 minute geological maps of the Palouse, Albion and Pullman quadrangles.  Bush explained the improvement in accuracy over the 1:250,000 geological map which is all that has been available for Whitman County prior to Bush and his team computerizing these large-scale geological maps.   Bush pointed out some of the specific features such as the northwest-southeast trending syncline-anticline series, the change in Wanapum series as one moves to the west and the dipping and thickening of the Grande Ronde as one goes west from Pullman.   The City of Palouse is located in a syncline and the Palouse River runs northwest from Palouse down the axis of the syncline.  It is possible that water runs down the sides of the syncline and this accounts for the relatively shallow depth to water in the Palouse area.   The Priest Rapids series of the Wanapum is 170 to 180 feet thick in the Moscow area.  The Rosa series of the Wanapum underlays the Priest Rapids series to the west of Albion so that the Wanapum formation is 200 plus feet thicker in the vicinity of Colfax than in Moscow where there is no Rosa series. 
Pullman is located both on an anticline and in a deformation zone which complicates the local geology.   A number of small dikes have been observed in Pullman indicating secondary intrusions which could be acting as barriers to water movement within and between aquifers.
Numerous wells are located on the maps and several cross-sections are attached.

3)      Summary Presentation of Water Sample Ages Study – Alyssa Douglas
Kent Keller introduced Alyssa and thanked PBAC for its support of this study of residence times for water samples from the Grande Ronde Aquifer System (GRAS).  Kent complemented Alyssa on her work in completing her thesis. 
Alyssa reviewed previous water sample dating done by Crosby and Chatters in 1965, most of which was on samples taken from the shallow or Wanapum aquifer system.  Where her samples overlapped with those of Crosby and Chatters, there was consistency in the ages or residency of the water samples measured.  Alyssa took 31 samples, which required collecting 13 gallons of water from each well.  Carbon 14, oxygen 18, pH, anions and cations were measured in each sample.  Tritium created in the atmosphere as a result of nuclear bomb testing which fell as precipitation shows up in water samples that are less than 50 years old.  Carbon 14, with a half-life of 5730 years, was use for dating the water samples.  Alyssa did a study of the possible sources of added carbon from the basalts, which would skew the dating, and concluded that no correction was needed to the dating equation because there are no significant sources of addition carbon in the basalts.
A key hypothesis of the study is that the ground water flows from the sites of younger samples to those of older samples. Then using a computer program called Netpath, which compares water chemistry, Alyssa constructed a map of probable ages for Grande Ronde water in the Palouse Basin based on the ages calculated for the sample points. The findings raise additional questions.  The oldest water samples measured were in the Moscow and Palouse areas which have been hyposthesized as being close to recharge areas.  Samples that were nearly as old were located on the other side of the basin in the Pullman and Colfax areas.  The youngest samples were from relatively shallow Grande Ronde wells, the McGreevey and Braudy wells, approximately half way between Moscow and Pullman and close to an anticlinal axis.  This may indicate a fracture zone that is allowing water to naturally flow from the shallow aquifer system down to the deeper aquifer system.
Only a few samples were taken from shallow aquifer wells.  With one exception, these samples indicated younger water than the samples from deep aquifer wells.  In general the deeper the source of the sample, the older the age measured. 
In response to a question about why the ages might be older in the Moscow area, Alyssa said the thickness of the loess, the presence and the thickness of the Vantage member, the presence of fragipans in the eastern portion of the basin and the thickness of the Wanapum basalt flows all probably contributed to the measured ages for these water samples. 
Alyssa recommended that PBAC do more age dating, especially in the areas away from the Moscow, Pullman, Colfax and Palouse pumping centers where there are no sampling wells at this time.  More study was also recommended for the area between Moscow and Pullman where the youngest samples were found to determine whether natural recharge is occurring along the anticlinal axis that trends northwest through the area.  Locating existing wells or siting monitoring wells in key locations should be a priority. 
John Bush recommended taking some samples to the east of Moscow where he thought younger water would be found.   

4)      Input to the Idaho Natural Resource Hearing on the Palouse Basin Aquifers, May 28
Kirkland informed PBAC that the Idaho interim legislative committee on Natural Resources would be holding a hearing on the Palouse Basin ground water situation on May 28^th in Moscow at 9:00 AM in the Palouse Room in the Best Western.  Hal Anderson from IDWR, who is working with the committee, has asked Kirkland to make a presentation on PBAC’s involvement in, research of and planning for the Palouse Basin ground water supply situation.  Kirkland reviewed PBAC’s current research goals which are to clarify where natural recharge to the two aquifer systems is occurring; how water moves through the basin and where it is leaving other than by pumping wells; and what the best options for economically enhancing recharge to the deep aquifer system are.  He said enhancing natural recharge from the North Fork of the Palouse River near the town of Palouse, Washington appears the most favorable option, if there is an effective connection to the Moscow and Pullman pumping centers.  Research beginning in fiscal year 2005 starting in July, 2004 is intended to clarify whether this is a realistic option.  The intent is to know by 2010 what options should be pursued to enhance recharge to the deep aquifer system and ensure stable water levels while meeting the water needs of a growing regional population.  Kirkland suggested that he lay out the tentative costs for present PBAC planning which includes: (1) three monitoring well fields in the triangle between Moscow, Palouse and Pullman where no monitoring wells exist and critical data are needed; (2) a pilot passive recharge well located at the UI ground water research site and (3) an infiltration basin pilot project at a yet to be determined site that could use either runoff from the Moscow Mountain front or waste water treatment plant effluent.  A preliminary estimate of the costs for these projects is between $600 and $700,000 but PBAC has already committed funding for the monitoring well field in Whitman County which is estimated at $150,000.
After some discussion the PBAC consensus was for Kirkland to present to the interim Idaho legislative committee on Natural Resources PBAC’s current planning and the tentative costs involved as outlined.

5)      FY 2004 Research Projects with signed Memorandums of Agreement
 Kirkland reported that 5 of the 7 project MOAs had been signed by the principal investigators and okayed by the University of Idaho.  Separate budgets were being set up for each research project in place of the aggregated budgeting previously used.  The other two MOAs involved one project at WSU that needed to go through the WSU grants and research office and the other with a consultant.  Kirkland was optimistic that the new budget summary would be available shortly.  Chairman Rob Corcoran requested that Kirkland email the new budget figures to members as soon as the figures became available.

6)     Drafts of proposed MOAs for FY 2005 Projects approved at April Meeting
Kirkland passed out copies of the three proposed projects to be incorporated into MOAs for FY 2005.  The same Memorandum of Agreement previously discussed would be used and the project descriptions with costs, timelines and deliverables would be incorporated into the MOAs.  PBAC members were to send any comments on the research project descriptions to Kirkland.

7)     OLD BUSINESS

a)  Status of the Annual Report
Kirkland reported that the final version was close but not yet in final publishing form.  Chairman Rob Corcoran requested that Kirkland email the final draft to members as soon as the final draft is available.

b)IDWR Order regarding Idaho Portion of Palouse Basin
Hal Anderson and Bob Haynes indicated that they and others were drafting suggestions for Director Dreher’s order addressing the Idaho portion of the Palouse Basin expected in June.

 

At this point several members needed to leave so the meeting was adjourned following the setting of the June meeting date for the 24^th rather than the normal date which would have been the 17^th.

 

8)     NEXT MEETING DATE

 

By consensus the meeting was adjourned.

Respectfully Submitted,

Larry Kirkland

Note: these minutes are submitted in draft form and have not yet been approved by the Committee.