GEOL 350 - Environmental Hydrology

Units: 4 ; Breadth Area: Sustainability
The hydrologic cycle and human impacts on the hydrologic cycle; quantitative assessment of hydrologic processes and concepts including precipitation, evapotranspiration, runoff, water budgets, and groundwater flow; surface water and groundwater contamination and remediation.

Prerequisites: Either CHEM 100 or CHEM 111, and either MATH 120, MATH 125, or MATH 130, and either PHYS 115, PHYS 125, or PHYS 135.
Equivalent Quarter Course: GEOL 3500.
Possible Instructional Methods: Entirely On-ground.
Grading: A-F grading only.
Breadth Area(s) Satisfied: Overlay - Sustainability
Cross-listed: ENSC 350.
Course Typically Offered: Spring ONLY

Student Learning Outcomes - Upon successful completion of this course students will be able to:

The Lecture component of this course has the following student learning outcomes: The Laboratory component of the class has the following learning outcomes:
Practice calculating water budgets and residence times for individual basins, for California, and in the global water cycle.
Demonstrate scientific literacy of human impacts on hydrologic processes.
Perform quantitative assessment of hydrologic processes such as evapotranspiration, runoff, water budgets, and groundwater flow.
Describe the fundamental differences between unconfined and confined aquifer systems, qualitatively and quantitatively.
Analyze the problems associated with the common contaminants and their occurrence in drinking water and with remediation.
Critically evaluate hydrologic data from publicly-available databases and the scientific literature.
Measure the hydraulic properties of different geologic materials and apply Darcy’s Law to determine the rate of groundwater flow in different geologic media.
Measure and analyze field data to determine stream discharge.
Calculate total maximum daily load (TMDL) using data gathered in the laboratory.

Sustainability Overlay Learning Outcomes

identify the environmental, social, and economic dimensions of sustainability, either in general or in relation to a specific problem;
analyze interactions between human activities and natural systems;
describe key threats to environmental sustainability; and
explain how individual and societal choices affect prospects for sustainability at the local, regional, and/or global levels.