Regional potentiometric-surface contours by Bedinger and Harrill (2004), for the Death Valley regional ground-water flow system study, Nevada and California

The contours in this digital data set represent the regional potentiometric surface developed by Bedinger and Harrill (2004) to assess potential interbasin flow in the Death Valley regional ground-water flow system (DVRFS). To obtain an adequate network of control points for that 100,000 square-kilometer region of southern Nevada and California, Bedinger and Harrill (2004) used regional potential altitudes derived from surface-water features, ground-water levels, topographic settings, deep wells, and spring data. A set of general guidelines was developed to relate regional ground-water potential to these more readily observed surface and near-surface ground-water levels and to hydrologic characteristics of ground-water basins in the DVRFS (see "Larger Work Citation", Appendix 1). Bedinger and Harrill (2004) hand-contoured the regional potential data to produce the DVRFS potentiometric-surface map.