The Illinois Water Inventory Program (IWIP), a comprehensive program to inventory water use throughout the state, began in 1978. It is designed to collect data in three major categories: water withdrawal, water use, and water returns. For each water-using facility inventoried, the database includes locations and amounts of water withdrawn from surface water and groundwater sources, as well as significant amounts of water purchased from other facilities. Public water supplies, self-supplied industries, irrigation, fish and wildlife, and conservation uses are inventoried. Data can be summarized geographically by county, township, and drainage basin, as well as by various water use and water source categories for inclusion in the National Water Use Data System.

Data Uses

Current uses of the data collected through the IWIP program include:

 

! Determination of community water supply usage: See Surface Water Sources and Public Water Supply Intakes

 

! Examination of groundwater level observations and groundwater withdrawals (for example, comparisons of potentiometric surface maps of the Cambrian-Ordovician aquifer system and pumpage from that aquifer system).

 

! Water use projections.

 

! Comparisons of aquifer withdrawals to estimated aquifer recharge (use-to-yield mapping).

! Regional groundwater modeling.

! Determination of groundwater use for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Lake Michigan Diversion Accounting Program.

! Environmental impacts (for example, the impact of a toxic spill on aquifers or surface water).

! Impact of high-capacity wells on neighboring wells.

! Publication in map form on the Arc/IMS portion of the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency’s Source Water Assessment Program. (This use is restricted to federal and state agency access only.)

 

Commercial-Industrial information is kept confidential: While the amount of water withdrawn by public wells and intakes is public information, the amount of water used by commercial and industrial facilities is not. Commercial-industrial pumpage, whether from wells or surface water intakes, is kept confidential unless the facility grants a specific release of the data. Commercial-industrial data is otherwise published only in combination with township or regional totals.

 

Data Collection

Every year, typically in January or February, a questionnaire about facilities’ use of water during the previous calendar year is sent to all participating facilities. Facilities are given approximately five weeks to complete and return the form in a postage-paid return envelope. These data are entered into the database. A second questionnaire is sent out to facilities who did not respond to the first questionnaire. The IWIP staff work year-round to gather information from participants in order to answer questions and fill data gaps for specific years.

 

How to Fill Out Your Water Inventory Form

This is a general outline of the steps in completing your inventory form. Please refer to this explanation of terms when completing the uppermost part of the first page of the IWIP form.

The following links display actual pages of the form and describe the questions in detail.

    Wells and Surface Water Intakes   (Detailed Description)

 

    Purchased and Self-Supplied Water Use   (Detailed Description)

 

    Well Treatment, Rehabilitation, and Water Levels   (Detailed Description)

Frequently Asked Questions

If you are unsure about some part of the form or do not know how to determine the amount of water your facility purchases or withdraws, please do not hesitate to call the IWIP office at 217-333-0239 or send an e-mail (tbryant@sws.uiuc.edu). Office hours are 8-12 and 1-4:30, Monday through Friday.

 

Mailing Address:

Illinois Water Inventory Program

Illinois State Water Survey

2204 Griffith Drive

Room 407A                                                    

Champaign, IL 61820

 

Phone: 217-333-0239

Fax:     217-244-0777