PANHANDLE PERSPECTIVES: New Publication Looks At State's Secondary Aquifers

Nebraska's underlying geological formations store more groundwater than any other state, and in western Nebraska groundwater is used for irrigation, livestock, municipal water systems, rural homes, and other uses.

Most groundwater users in western Nebraska can tap into the two largest most extensively used aquifers in Nebraska, known as primary aquifers. These include the High Plains Aquifer (sometimes called the Ogallala Aquifer) and the shallow sand and gravel layers common across the state. But those two primary aquifers don't exist or aren't usable everywhere. So some groundwater users...