The Groundwater Recovery Paradox in South India

Hora, Tejasvi; Srinivasan, Veena; Basu, Nandita B.

doi:10.1029/2019gl083525

Cited by 46 publications

(52 citation statements)

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“…The development of affordable drilling enabled groundwater to play a fundamental role in the Indian green revolution (Shah et al 2003) and by 2010 groundwater abstraction was estimated to comprise more than 60% of all irrigation (World Bank 2010). The sustainability of abstraction and its impact on surface water is contested in Indian crystalline-rock aquifers: there is some evidence from groundwater monitoring boreholes and satellite measurement of Earth's gravity that groundwater levels are not declining (Tiwari et al 2011) or that they are declining in only 22-36% of wells (Sishodia et al 2016), but others caution unintentional bias in monitoring (Hora et al 2019). Notwithstanding, there is considerable evidence of problems in individual catchments with falling groundwater levels and periodic loss of groundwater baseflow to rivers (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Groundwater connectivity of a sheared gneiss aquifer in the Cauvery River basin, India

et al. 2020

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Connectivity of groundwater flow within crystalline-rock aquifers controls the sustainability of abstraction and baseflow to rivers, yet is often poorly constrained at a catchment scale. Here groundwater connectivity in a sheared gneiss aquifer is investigated by studying the intensively abstracted Berambadi catchment (84 km 2) in the Cauvery River Basin, southern India, with geological characterisation, aquifer properties testing, hydrograph analysis, hydrochemical tracers and a numerical groundwater flow model. The study indicates a well-connected system, both laterally and vertically, that has evolved with high abstraction from a laterally to a vertically dominated flow system. Likely as a result of shearing, a high degree of lateral connectivity remains at low groundwater levels. Because of their low storage and logarithmic reduction in hydraulic conductivity with depth, crystalline-rock aquifers in environments such as this, with high abstraction and variable seasonal recharge, constitute a highly variable water resource, meaning farmers must adapt to varying water availability. Importantly, this study indicates that abstraction is reducing baseflow to the river, which, if also occurring in other similar catchments, will have implications downstream in the Cauvery River Basin.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Groundwater connectivity of a sheared gneiss aquifer in the Cauvery River basin, India

et al. 2020

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“…Although the presence and subsequent loss of a shallow water table seems likely given the prevalence of groundwater irrigated agriculture in the watershed, direct observations of historical groundwater are not possible. Publicly available groundwater data are biased towards observation wells in which the water level can be observed (i.e., wells that are not dry), meaning that wells that dry out over time are excluded from the record (Hora et al, ). Satellite observations from the GRACE mission are equally ineffective in the TG Halli, both because the GRACE data require an excessively large smoothing filter on the order of 300 km (Zhang, Chao, Lu, & Hsu, ) and the GRACE satellite record began in 2002 after much of the drying in the TG Halli had occurred (Tapley, Bettadpur, Watkins, & Reigber, ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Long‐term groundwater level observations in the TG Halli watershed were either unavailable or unreliable (e.g., see Ballukraya & Srinivasan, ; Hora, Srinivasan, & Basu, ). To assess shallow groundwater levels in the study watersheds, we surveyed 99 shallow open wells during the 2014 monsoon season (for locations, see Figure S1).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A process‐based approach to attribution of historical streamflow decline in a data‐scarce and human‐dominated watershed

Penny

Srinivasan

Apoorva

et al. 2020

Hydrological Processes

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Human activities have resulted in rapid hydrological change around the world, in many cases producing shifts in the dominant hydrological processes, confounding predictions, and complicating effective management and planning. Identifying and characterizing such changes in hydrological processes is therefore a globally relevant problem, one that is particularly challenging in sparsely monitored environments. We develop a novel, process-based approach for attribution of hydrological change in such scenarios and apply the approach to the TG Halli watershed outside Bangalore, India, where streamflow has declined considerably over the last 50 years. The approach consists of (a) employing a range of field instrumentation and experiments to identify contemporary streamflow generation mechanisms, (b) using these observations to constrain our understanding and generate hypotheses pertaining to historical changes, and (c) evaluating these hypotheses with a range of evidence including proxies for historical hydrological processes. The body of evidence in the TG Halli watershed indicates the historical presence and subsequent loss of a shallow groundwater table that previously discharged to the stream, meaning that groundwater depletion is the most likely driver of streamflow decline. These findings present a viable path towards improved predictions of future water resources and sustainable water management within the watershed. Our process-based approach to attribution has the potential to improve understanding of human-driven hydrological change in regions with poor monitoring of hydrological systems. K E Y W O R D S attribution, data scarcity, groundwater depletion, hydrological change, nonstationary hydrology, streamflow generation

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“…It is noted that the ensemble mean SMS from four land surface models (VIC, CLM, NOAH, MOSAIC) of NASA's Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) (Rodell et al, 2004) is a more dynamic component than SWS and SNS (from the same GLDAS models) for the whole region and sub‐regions of northern India (see supporting information Figure S1). For consistency with the previous studies in India (e.g., Asoka et al, 2017; Hora et al, 2019; Panda & Wahr, 2016), we, however, use the GRACE TWS from CSR, particularly the Mascon (version RL05) gravity solutions that are parameterised with regional mass concentration ‘mascon’ functions to reduce leakage errors (Save et al, 2016). As such, relative to the traditional spherical harmonics solutions, the mascon product has been found effective at water management or river basin scales (Castellazzi et al, 2016).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…GRACE measurements have provided useful information about the large-scale depletions in northern India. However, estimates show varying trends in GWS because of differences in study area, time period, well types (shallow vs. deep) and variations in GRACE data-processing strategies (Hora et al, 2019;Long et al, 2016;Panda & Wahr, 2016;Rodell et al, 2009;Tiwari et al, 2009). Indeed, highly localised and spatially non-uniform nature of groundwater storage (Gleeson et al, 2012;Scanlon et al, 2012) underscores the importance of in-situ measurements for precise assessment and validation of GRACE data at scales that are suitable for water resources management and policy development (Castellazzi et al, 2016).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Groundwater depletion in northern India: Impacts of the sub‐regional anthropogenic land‐use, socio‐politics and changing climate

Panda

Ambast

Shamsudduha

2020

Hydrological Processes

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Understanding the key drivers behind intensive use of groundwater resources and subsequent depletion in northern India is important for future food security of India. Although spatio-temporal changes of groundwater storage (GWS) and its depletion in northern India are mapped using the NASA's GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) records, the sub-regional diverse socio-political and environmental factors contributing to the variability in groundwater withdrawals and renewals are not well documented. Here, we provide new evidence on changes in GWS at different spatial scales using both observations and satellite-based measurements applying both parametric and non-parametric statistical analyses. The substantial loss of GWS has occurred since the beginning of the 21st century, and the decline in GWS is associated with some record-breaking dry and hot climate events. We present how certain state-based policy decisions, such as supplying free electricity for irrigation, prompted farmers to extract groundwater unsustainably and thus led to widespread GWS deletion, which has been also accelerated by frequent dryness and rising temperatures. In the hotspot of Punjab, Haryana and Delhi of northern India, the extracted groundwater during 1985-2013 is equivalent to a metre-high layer if spread uniformly across its geographical domain. We find that the groundwater storage loss in northern India has increased rapidly from 17 km 3 to 189 km 3 between the pre-2002 and 2002-2013 periods. This loss in northern India is, therefore, an excellent example of rapid surface greening and sub-surface drying-a result of an interplay of socio-political and environmental factors. As groundwater continues to be treated as a common natural resource and no clear definition exists to guide policymaking, this study also illustrates how the administrative district level approach can solve the widespread problem of depletion. K E Y W O R D S climate extremes, food security, groundwater depletion, indo-Gangetic plain aquifer, land-use change, socio-political drivers 1 | INTRODUCTION As many regions around the world have started to experience more severe droughts accompanied by a hotter-than-normal climate (i.e., dry and hot events) (Overpeck, 2013), the ubiquitous pressure on freshwater resources is imminent. Specifically, groundwater storage (GWS) losses in the world's agriculturally-important aquifer systems have captured considerable attention of scientific community and policy makers (Dalin et al., 2017; Famiglietti, 2014; Gleeson et al., 2012). This raises the key scientific question-can groundwater act as a

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The Groundwater Recovery Paradox in South India

Cited by 46 publications

References 40 publications

Groundwater connectivity of a sheared gneiss aquifer in the Cauvery River basin, India

Groundwater connectivity of a sheared gneiss aquifer in the Cauvery River basin, India

A process‐based approach to attribution of historical streamflow decline in a data‐scarce and human‐dominated watershed

Groundwater depletion in northern India: Impacts of the sub‐regional anthropogenic land‐use, socio‐politics and changing climate

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