Impacts of groundwater pumping and climate variability on groundwater availability in the Rio Grande Basin

Sheng, Zhuping

doi:10.1890/es12-00270.1

Cited by 47 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…Generally, though, impacts of changing demands on groundwater systems, whether due directly to climate changes or indirectly through changes in land use or surface-water availability and management, are likely to cause more immediate changes in groundwater availability (Taylor et al 2012, Sheng 2013. Changes in recharge and resulting changes in storage may be more subtle and take longer to emerge.…”

Section: Groundwatermentioning

confidence: 99%

Western water and climate change

Dettinger

Udall

Georgakakos

2015

Ecological Applications

195

157

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The western United States is a region long defined by water challenges. Climate change adds to those historical challenges, but does not, for the most part, introduce entirely new challenges; rather climate change is likely to stress water supplies and resources already in many cases stretched to, or beyond, natural limits. Projections are for continued and, likely, increased warming trends across the region, with a near certainty of continuing changes in seasonality of snowmelt and streamflows, and a strong potential for attendant increases in evaporative demands. Projections of future precipitation are less conclusive, although likely the northern-most West will see precipitation increases while the southernmost West sees declines. However, most of the region lies in a broad area where some climate models project precipitation increases while others project declines, so that only increases in precipitation uncertainties can be projected with any confidence. Changes in annual and seasonal hydrographs are likely to challenge water managers, users, and attempts to protect or restore environmental flows, even where annual volumes change little. Other impacts from climate change (e.g., floods and water-quality changes) are poorly understood and will likely be location dependent. In this context, four iconic river basins offer glimpses into specific challenges that climate change may bring to the West. The Colorado River is a system in which overuse and growing demands are projected to be even more challenging than climate-change-induced flow reductions. The Rio Grande offers the best example of how climate-change-induced flow declines might sink a major system into permanent drought. The Klamath is currently projected to face the more benign precipitation future, but fisheries and irrigation management may face dire straits due to warming air temperatures, rising irrigation demands, and warming waters in a basin already hobbled by tensions between endangered fisheries and agricultural demands. Finally, California's Bay-Delta system is a remarkably localized and severe weakness at the heart of the region's trillion-dollar economy. It is threatened by the full range of potential climate-change impacts expected across the West, along with major vulnerabilities to increased flooding and rising sea levels.

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Section: Groundwatermentioning

confidence: 99%

Western water and climate change

Dettinger

Udall

Georgakakos

2015

Ecological Applications

195

157

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“…Gelhar and McLin (1979) showed that total dissolved solids (TDS) in the alluvium aquifer increases from ~1000 mg/L in the northern Mesilla Basin to 8000 mg/L in the southern basin. The alluvium aquifer is recharged by seepage from the Rio Grande and irrigation Hiebing et al | Gravity and groundwater studies of the southern Mesilla Basin GEOSPHERE | Volume 14 | Number 4 water (Sheng, 2013). Individual wells with high salinity or iron values appear to tap abandoned river channels and swamp or bog deposits (Arunshankar, 1993).…”

Section: Hydrological Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Individual wells with high salinity or iron values appear to tap abandoned river channels and swamp or bog deposits (Arunshankar, 1993). The Rio Grande alluvium is hydrologically connected to the underlying aquifers within the Santa Fe Group, leading some researchers (e.g., Sheng, 2013) to propose that use of Rio Grande water and saline groundwater from the Rio Grande aquifer for flood irrigation has led to the increased salinity observed within the Santa Fe Group aquifers in the southern Mesilla Basin.…”

Section: Hydrological Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geophysical studies of fault and bedrock control on groundwater geochemistry within the southern Mesilla Basin, western Texas and southern New Mexico

et al. 2018

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“…The deeper Hueco Bolson and large portions of the Mesilla Bolson are primarily "fossil" deposits of water with little or no recharge. Thus, drawdown represents withdrawals against current and future reserves [8]. This scenario is being repeated not only in other river basins of the southwestern U.S., but also in other arid and semi-arid regions of the world that are dependent primarily on a desert river basin and its associated aquifers to meet the needs of irrigated agriculture, as well as growing urban populations [37].…”

Section: Case Study Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This part of the Rio Grande basin can be characterized as having limited and dwindling supplies of water, increasing demands for water from multiple sectors, and a segmented governance system spanning two U.S. states and two countries [5]. On top of this, the region faces a number of drivers of change, including: (1) climate change that is impacting both (a)water supply, through reduced snowpack and timing of flows in the headwaters, and (b) demand, through increasing temperatures and greater evapotranspiration; (2) agricultural practices and trends, especially increasing production of high water demand crops and greater reliance on groundwater of marginal quality for irrigation; (3) urban growth, impacting water demand and quality (through wastewater discharges); and (4) growing demand for environmental services, such as riparian habitat and environmental flows [5][6][7][8]. In this mix of changing conditions, the prevailing water governance in the region was developed for the situation that existed about 100 years ago, and is characterized by rigid water institutions, weak participation, division by artificial borders, and quiet but protracted conflicts [5].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Comprehensive Process for Stakeholder Identification and Engagement in Addressing Wicked Water Resources Problems

Hargrove

Heyman

2020

Land

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Various sectors of stakeholders (urban, agricultural, policymakers, etc.) are frequently engaged in participatory research projects aimed at improving water resources’ sustainability. However, a process for comprehensive and integrative identification, classification, and engagement of all types of water stakeholders for a region or river basin, especially in a transboundary context, is missing for water resources research projects. Our objective was to develop a systematic approach to identifying and classifying water stakeholders, and engage them in a discussion of water futures, as a foundation for a participatory modeling research project to address the wicked water resource problems of the Middle Rio Grande basin on the U.S./Mexico border. This part of the Rio Grande basin can be characterized as having limited and dwindling supplies of water, increasing demands for water from multiple sectors, and a segmented governance system spanning two U.S. states and two countries. These challenges are being exacerbated by climate change; a transitioning agriculture to more water demanding, high value crops; urbanization; and growing demand for environmental services. Moving forward, a core question for this region is how can water be managed so that the three competing sectors—agricultural, urban, and environmental—can realize a sustainable future in this challenged water system? We identified the major water-using sectors who represent competing demands as including agricultural, municipal, self-supplied industrial users, environmental, and a sector we labeled “social justice”, comprised of individuals who lack access to potable water, or who represent groups who advocate for access to water. We included stakeholders from both the U.S. and Mexico, which is seldom done, who share transboundary water resources in the region. We hosted a series of stakeholder dialogues and obtained results that identified and described their vision for the future of water; challenges to be overcome; and important research questions that could be addressed using participatory modeling approaches. Four broad themes common to multiple sectors emerged: (1) quantity, drought, and scarcity; (2) quality/salinization; (3) urbanization; and (4) conservation and sustainability. Each sector expressed distinctive views regarding the future of water. Agricultural stakeholders, in particular, had strong feelings of ownership of water rights as part of land ownership and a concomitant sense of threat to those water rights emanating from dwindling supplies and competing demands. The contribution of this work is a methodology for identifying, classifying, and engaging all types of stakeholders in the context of a research project, enabling us to compare and contrast views of different types of stakeholders. Heretofore, this has been accomplished in “bits and pieces”, but never comprehensively and holistically.

show abstract

Impacts of groundwater pumping and climate variability on groundwater availability in the Rio Grande Basin

Cited by 47 publications

References 47 publications

Western water and climate change

Western water and climate change

Geophysical studies of fault and bedrock control on groundwater geochemistry within the southern Mesilla Basin, western Texas and southern New Mexico

A Comprehensive Process for Stakeholder Identification and Engagement in Addressing Wicked Water Resources Problems

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