The USGS Central Midwest Water Science Center is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research in regional water-availability assessments for the Illinois River Basin (ILRB). The USGS Integrated Water Availability Assessments (IWAAs) are a multi-extent, stakeholder driven, near real-time census and prediction of water availability for both human and ecological uses at regional and national extents. Water availability reflects the quantity, timing, quality, and use of water resources. The ILRB, defined as the watershed upstream of Mississippi River confluence at Grafton, IL, was selected as a midwestern Regional IWAAs basin focusing on nutrient issues and harmful algal blooms (HABs) as part of a USGS Integrated Water Science (IWS) Basin project. These regional intensive assessments in reference basins form the mechanism to develop and evolve nationally integrated assessment and prediction capacity and applications, which will be completed in coordination with the IWS Basin planning process.This funding opportunity will bring together scientists from the USGS and a CESU-affiliated partner on a research objective for local and regional water availability assessments. This research will focus on the initial MODFLOW 6 groundwater flow model developed for the Illinois River Basin, including finalizing, publishing, and extending use for the simulation of subsurface nitrate.

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