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Environmental Geology Field Camp

May 11 - June 6, 2009

The course is appropriate for upper class undergraduates and graduate students. A background in major aspects of hydrologic cycle (surface water, vadose zone, groundwater), water chemistry, geophysics, and Quaternary geology are useful, but not required.  The course is worth 4 credit hours.

Like our traditional Geology Field Camp, the Environmental Geology Field Camp is  run jointly with the Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences at Northern Illinois University.  For ISU graduate students, the course is a required part of the graduate curriculum.  For NIU undergraduates, this fulfills the requirement for a field methods course.  The course is also open to students at other universities.

This course is designed to provide practical experience in data collection and interpretation.  Students in the class will be directly involved in using the latest field and computer technology being applied to environmental problems.  Theoretical discussions are  included as needed.  However, the focus of this course is on the techniques used to collect field data, and conceptual and quantitative interpretations of the data collected.

The topics to be covered include:

Field methods in hydrogeology

  • Water table contour maps

  • Aquifer and slug testing

  • Local and regional  hydrogeologic framework

  • Drilling and well installation

Surface water hydrology

  • Stream guaging

  • Stream dye tracer test

  • Stream sediment mobility

Water quality

  • Groundwater and surface water sampling techniques

  • Field measurement of water quality parameters

  • Field analysis of water chemistry

  • Inorganic water analysis

  • Organic water analysis

  • Microbiology of water

 

Environmental geophysics

  • Seismic reflection

  • Resistivity

  • Conductivity

  • Ground penetrating radar

Field Trips

  • Lake Calumet (Superfund site)

  • Quaternary deposits of northern Illinois

  • Waste water plant

Regional landscape history and environmental change

  • Local and regional  Quaternary geology

  • Surficial geologic mapping

  • Core drilling

  • Stratigraphic section/soil classification

  • Regional context of soils and soil mapping

  • Climate history and change

If you would like more information on this course, please contact:

Dr. Steve Van der Hoven
Illinois State University
Department of Geography - Geology
Campus Box 4400
Normal, IL. 61790 - 4400
phone: (309) 438-3493
vanderhoven@ilstu.edu