Alta, Wyoming Groundwater Flow

by Jose Torres

Submitted : Spring 2014

Alta is a small rural area in Teton County, Wyoming. According to The Wyoming Development Commission, development in this area has recently increased due to the rapid growth of neighboring communities in both Wyoming and the neighboring state of Idaho. This area amounts to about 8800 acres, most residential homes in this area rely in a well and septic system for the supply of water and disposal of sewer waste. It is of very high importance to understand how ground water functions not only to build more effective well systems, but to also prevent water contamination due to near by septic system leaching. This can be determined using simple integration of an important hydrological equation called Darcy’s Law to find ground water flow rate and a contoured water map to determine direction. In this particular area of Wyoming the ground water has a flow rate of 39.52m² /day in a direction to the west. It would be of particular interest to place septic systems to the west of any particular well. In this manner, the ground water supplied by a certain well will avoid pumping contaminated ground water.

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