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Nichols- Int. 3384
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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
INFORMATION SERVICE

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GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

For Release APRIL 2, 1950
LONG ISLAND SANDS BUTTRESS NEW YORK CITY'S WATER SUPPLY
Metropolitan New York's water shortage would be more severe than it now is if it were not for the aid of water drawn from glacially deposited sands of Long Island, Secretary of the Interior Oscar L. Chapman said today.

Secretary Chapman disclosed that during the drought months of 1949 when many surface and ground-water supplies were being depleted at an alarming rate in the Northeast, Long Island's abundant resources provided sufficient water not only for local public supplies and a large number of private companies and municipalities, but for emergency drafts by the City of New York. 

For more than 50 years, Long Island's highly productive and readily replenishable water-bearing sands and gravels have been utilized on a large scale for public water supply and for industrial, agricultural and domestic uses, Secretary Chapman said. The Island's main aquifers are essentially two prolific strata laid down in the Pleistocene Period by the Great Ice Sheet and two in deeper-lying Upper and Lower Cretaceous beds that were formed when dinosaurs roamed land across of the northeast. These layers are capable of yielding 1,000 million gallons a day (mgd). 

The 1949 emergency could not have been met, Mr. Chapman observed, if excessive withdrawals of a few years ago had not been corrected by subsequent water conservation measures on the Island. Large users of ground-water for air-conditioning or other purposes which do not pollute the water are now required, wherever possible, to return such water by way of ground-recharge wells.

Calling attention to a report of the U.S. Geological Survey prepared by N.J. Lusczynaki, Secretary Chapman noted that withdrawals of ground water at one time were so heavy at the southern end of the Island that seawater began to seep through to replace or spoil the potable supplies. That condition, he said, has now been largely corrected.

The Geological Survey's report was prepared in cooperation with the New York Water Power and Control Commission: the Nassau County Department of Public Works; Suffolk Country Board of Supervisors, and the Suffolk County Water Authority. At the conclusion of the paper, titled "Withdrawal of Ground Water and Surface Water on Long Island, New York" the author predicts that the heavy 1949 demands by metropolitan New York will be exceeded in 1950

"New York City probably will have to continue heavy emergency withdrawals throughout the year," he said. "In addition, many new wells for public supply, industrial use, and supplemental irrigation are being constructed in Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk Counties. Local pumpage will also be increased.