In the summer of 2016, Nova Scotia experienced a drought that was particularly severe in the southwestern part of the province, where it was the driest summer recorded in over 140 years. This area of the province relies heavily on shallow dug wells for domestic water supplies. Over 1,000 wells went dry and some municipalities reported that 25% of their residents were without water. Since 2016, there have been two similar droughts (2018 and 2020) and climate change predictions indicate that extreme weather events like these will become more common in the future. During the 2016 drought, there was a need to track aquifer levels in real-time so that emergency management staff could plan relief programs and the public could be kept informed about the drought impacts. Therefore, a low-cost, real-time, water level meter was developed by the Nova Scotia Geological Survey and used to build a province-wide shallow aquifer monitoring network. The meters are installed in volunteer domestic dug wells and use ultrasonic water level sensors and Internet-of-Things technology to measure the water table level on a daily basis. The data are sent to the Internet by WiFi or cellular connection where they are plotted in real-time and available for immediate download. Further information about the network, including an interactive map for viewing the real-time data and instructions for building the real-time meters, is available here: https://novascotia.ca/natr/meb/water-resources/aquifer-network.asp.

Presenter: John Drage, Hydrogeologist, Nova Scotia Geological Survey

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