Hydrologic Sinks for the U.S. Pacific Territories
Hydrologic sinks are landscape depressions where water can accumulate without a surface outflow. These features influence water storage and movement and play an important role in island hydrology. Identifying potential places where water may accumulate provide an insight to places contributing to local aquifer recharge.
This subproduct provides hydrologic sink data layers for the U.S. Pacific Territories (American Samoa, Guam, and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands) developed using NOAA Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) of approximately a 3-meter resolution. The dataset includes three layers: (1) dominant landcover within each sink (impervious, water, or other), (2) sink depth, and (3) sink volume. These data layers provide important insights for groundwater protection, flood risk assessment, and climate adaptation in island systems, and were identified by the Water and Environmental Research Institute of the Western Pacific (WERI) as valuable source for monitoring the Northern Guam Lens Aquifer a critical water supply under stress from overuse, pollution, and intermittent drought.