@conference {JRN54412,
	title = {Satellite observations of ground water changes in New Mexico},
	booktitle = {59th Annual New Mexico Water Conference},
	year = {2014},
	month = {11/2014},
	address = {Santa Fe, NM},
	abstract = {<p>In 2002 NASA launched the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE)\&nbsp;satellite mission. GRACE consists of two satellites with a separation of about 200 km. \&nbsp;By accurately measuring the separation between the twin satellites, the differences in the gravity field can be determined.\&nbsp;Monthly observations of these differences can be related to changes in the mass below the satellites. \&nbsp;On land these mass changes are primarily due to movement of water and GRACE effectively weighs the total amount of water (snow, surface water, groundwater and soil moisture) entering or leaving a region each month. \&nbsp;A paper published in Science in 2013 by Famiglietti and Rodell presents results for the rate of change for the observed mass over the US between 2002 and 2013. \&nbsp;In particular they found the loss of water from the southern high plains aquifer to be substantial (-2.5 cm/year) and attribute this loss to an overreliance on groundwater to supply irrigation needs. \&nbsp;We analyzed GRACE data for 2007 to 2013 covering a location in south central New Mexico (107.8 W and 33 N) and found a decrease in the total water stored of about 2.0 million acre feet a year over an area of 200,000 km^2.\&nbsp; We believe this result reflects groundwater depletion in south central New Mexico and the lower than average regional precipitation between 2007 and 2013.</p>
},
	author = {T. J. Schmugge and Emile H. Elias and Rodell, Matt and A. Rango}
}
