Use of stream response functions to determine impacts of replacing surface-water use with groundwater withdrawals

A regional-scale numerical groundwater model is used to study the impacts of replacing surface-water use with groundwater wells to improve low-flow stream conditions for endangered species within the Bertrand and Fishtrap watersheds, southern British Columbia, Canada and Washington, USA. Stream response functions ranging from 0 to 1.0 were calculated for individual wells placed within a steady-state groundwater flow model at varying distances from the streams to determine the impact that these replacement wells, operating under sustained pumping rates, would have on summer instream flows. Lower response ratios indicate groundwater pumping will have less of an impact on streamflow than taking an equivalent amount of water directly from a surface-water source. Results show that replacing surface-water use with groundwater withdrawals may be a viable alternative for increasing summer streamflows. Assuming combined response factors should be ≤0.5 for irrigators to undergo the expense of installing new wells, ~57% of the land area within 0.8 km of Bertrand Creek would be suitable for replacement wells. Similarly, 70% of the land area within 0.8 km of Fishtrap Creek was found to be appropriate. A visual analysis tool was developed using STELLA to allow stakeholders to quickly evaluate the impact associated with moving their water right.     

Shoreline management in a policy vacuum: A local authority perspective

In Ireland there is no national shoreline management policy. Instead, management involves a series of actions at the local authority (County) level that respond to local demands, politics and economics within only a broad legal framework. Through the COREPOINT project, University of Ulster scientists have been working with local authority officials in Donegal to bring a scientific understanding of coastal processes to bear on practical management. Experience at several sites has shown significant changes in practice as a result of this interaction, compared to the previous situation when rock armouring was the favoured response to coastal erosion. We argue that achieving sustainable approaches to coastal management in a policy vacuum relies on a combination of (i) commitment to these approaches by local officials, (ii) low levels of public pressure for action, and (iii) limited financial resources. A change in any one of these is likely to lead to unsustainable actions. While close co-operation with scientists can help management in the absence of a coherent policy, only a formal regulatory instrument can deliver sustainable shoreline management.     

Palaeokarst in the Ordovician of the southern Great Basin, USA: implications for sea-level history

Abundant and regionally unique dolostone lithoclast breccias occur throughout the shallow-marine, Lower to Middle Ordovician Pogonip Group in the Nopah Range and adjacent ranges in eastern California and southern Nevada. Breccia bodies display sharply cross-cutting relationships with host dolostone bedrock stratigraphy. They also show stratigraphic variability in size, shape and dolostone clast composition, but similarity in breccia matrix composition and framework texture and fabric. These characteristics are consistent with a palaeokarst origin. Upsection changes in breccia clast lithology as well as multiple occurrences of associated quartz sand-filled grikes (solution-widened fissures) indicate multiple episodes of carbonate platform exposure and karstification. Repeated karstification is also indicated by stratiform bodies of quartz sand and thin terra rossa palaeosols that locally truncate breccias and grike systems, thus bracketing karstified exposure surfaces. Facies successions and stacking patterns between recognized exposure surfaces are developed as transgressive–regressive cycles and thus show depositional sequence architecture. Hence, these breccias and other associated palaeokarst features are related to a succession of disconformities that provide a sequence-stratigraphic framework for assessing Ordovician relative sea-level history of the south-western Cordilleran margin of Laurentia.     

Sodic amphiboles and pyroxenes from fenites in East Africa

During alkali metasomatism of the country-rock associated with ijolite-carbonatite complexes the development of sodic amphibole and/or pyroxene is characteristic. In this paper, some new chemical analyses of these minerals, together with published analyses from fenites of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, include those of co-existing pairs of amphibole and pyroxene. The common amphiboles of the fenites are magnesioarfvedsonites with 100 Mg: Mg+Fe+Mn ranging from 67 to 36. They co-exist with aegirines having 0.75 to 0.89 ions Fe⁺³. Most of these minerals are poor in Ca; co-existing pairs tend to show corresponding increases in Ca and in Fe⁺². In the syenitic fenites of Tororo and Budeda, considered to have formed at higher temperatures, the stable mineral is aegirine-augite. New analyses of richterite, magnesioarfvedsonite and aegirine from carbonate-rich rocks are also presented, and the relation between fenites and carbonatites is discussed.     

Analysis of State and Provincial Atlas Reviews*

Ninety-eight reviews of state and provincial atlases are examined in order to address several questions. Reviews are subjected to content analysis to identify the judgement criteria that experts use in evaluating a provincial or state atlas, and the aspects of each criterion that reviewers praise or condemn. An attempt is made to search for expert consensus and to identify a provincial or state atlas review recipe. The research reported here is part of a larger study undertaken to assist those in the process of planning a new provincial or state atlas initiative. This paper also assists individuals who are searching for rules and guidelines when undertaking an atlas review.     

Rare-earth and LIL element fractionation in high-grade charnockitic gneisses,south Norway

High-Fe, intermediate-acid, charnockitic gneisses in the Arendal-Tromøy area of the Svecofennian terrain of southeast Norway comprise two chemically contrasting zones - one with normal large-ion-lithophile (LIL) element characteristics, and the other IIL-deficint. The noramal -LiLL-deficient varitties also have low ΣEEE, commonly with positive Eu anomalies. The normal-LIL rocks are enriched in ?REE, exhibit fractionated patterns and have negative Eu anomalies. Modelling shows that both the LIL and REE patterns are consistent with an essentially primary fractionation process involving the separation of cumulus (LIL-deficient) phases from andesitic-dacitic magma emplaced directly under the high-grade conditions, with the normal-LIL rocks crystallising from the residual melt. This process is interpreted as a deep-seated component of the magma system which culminated in the emplacement of some higher level rapakivi granite late in the Svecofennian event. The model presented does not require anorthosite to be part of the same magma system.