scholarly journals Effect of Climate Variability and Change in Groundwater in Europe

1990 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 185-194 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Thomsen
Keyword(s):  
Climate Variability ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Groundwater Recharge ◽  
Historical Data ◽  
Public Water Supply ◽  
Climate Variability And Change ◽  
Winter Rainfall ◽  
The Past ◽  
Current Value ◽  
Recharge Rates

Public water supply in Europe relies very heavily on groundwater. Recharge of groundwater takes place mainly in the winter months. An analysis of winter rainfall data shows that current recharge rates are abnormally high, and that during several periods in the past the rate has been less than half the current value. A return to such low values could have catastrophic consequences, but even more modest drops would be serious. Useful predictions must be based on climatic models and the full use of climatic, paleohydrological and historical data.

scholarly journals Enhanced groundwater recharge rates and altered recharge sensitivity to climate variability through subsurface heterogeneity

2017 ◽  
Vol 114 (11) ◽  
pp. 2842-2847 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andreas Hartmann ◽  
Tom Gleeson ◽  
Yoshihide Wada ◽  
Thorsten Wagener
Keyword(s):  
Climate Variability ◽  
Groundwater Recharge ◽  
Carbonate Rock ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Groundwater Resources ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Important Variable ◽  
Hydrological Models ◽  
Subsurface Heterogeneity ◽  
Recharge Rates

Our environment is heterogeneous. In hydrological sciences, the heterogeneity of subsurface properties, such as hydraulic conductivities or porosities, exerts an important control on water balance. This notably includes groundwater recharge, which is an important variable for efficient and sustainable groundwater resources management. Current large-scale hydrological models do not adequately consider this subsurface heterogeneity. Here we show that regions with strong subsurface heterogeneity have enhanced present and future recharge rates due to a different sensitivity of recharge to climate variability compared with regions with homogeneous subsurface properties. Our study domain comprises the carbonate rock regions of Europe, Northern Africa, and the Middle East, which cover ∼25% of the total land area. We compare the simulations of two large-scale hydrological models, one of them accounting for subsurface heterogeneity. Carbonate rock regions strongly exhibit “karstification,” which is known to produce particularly strong subsurface heterogeneity. Aquifers from these regions contribute up to half of the drinking water supply for some European countries. Our results suggest that water management for these regions cannot rely on most of the presently available projections of groundwater recharge because spatially variable storages and spatial concentration of recharge result in actual recharge rates that are up to four times larger for present conditions and changes up to five times larger for potential future conditions than previously estimated. These differences in recharge rates for strongly heterogeneous regions suggest a need for groundwater management strategies that are adapted to the fast transit of water from the surface to the aquifers.

scholarly journals Understanding process controls on groundwater recharge variability across Africa through recharge landscapes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles West ◽  
Rafael Rosolem ◽  
Alan MacDonald ◽  
Mark Cuthbert ◽  
Thorsten Wagener
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Groundwater Recharge ◽  
Mean Annual Precipitation ◽  
Clear Understanding ◽  
Land Area ◽  
Recharge Rates ◽  
Landscape Units ◽  
Process Controls ◽  
Global Datasets

Groundwater is critical in supporting current and future reliable water supply throughout Africa. Although continental maps of groundwater storage and recharge have been developed, we currently lack a clear understanding on how the controls on groundwater recharge vary across the entire continent. Reviewing the existing literature, we synthesize information on reported groundwater recharge controls in Africa. We find that 15 out of 22 of these controls can be characterised using global datasets. We develop 11 descriptors of climatic, topographic, vegetation, soil and geologic properties using global datasets, to characterise groundwater recharge controls in Africa. These descriptors cluster Africa into 15 Recharge Landscape Units for which we expect recharge controls to be similar. Over 80% of the continents land area is organized by just nine of these units. We also find that aggregating the Units by similarity into four broader Recharge Landscapes (Desert, Dryland, Wet tropical and Wet tropical forest) provides a suitable level of landscape organisation to explain differences in ground-based long-term mean annual recharge and recharge ratio estimates. Furthermore, wetter Recharge Landscapes are more efficient in converting rainfall to recharge than drier Recharge Landscapes as well as having higher annual recharge rates. In Dryland Recharge Landscapes, we found that annual recharge rates largely varied according to mean annual precipitation, whereas recharge ratio estimates increase with increasing monthly variability in P-PET. However, we were unable to explain why ground-based estimates of recharge signatures vary across other Recharge Landscapes, in which there are fewer ground-based recharge estimates, using global datasets alone. Even in dryland regions, there is still considerable unexplained variability in the estimates of annual recharge and recharge ratio, stressing the limitations of global datasets for investigating ground-based information.

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