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Assessing the restoration time of surface water and groundwater systems under groundwater pumping

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Abstract

Since surface water and groundwater systems are fully coupled and integrated, increased groundwater withdrawal during drought may reduce groundwater discharges into the stream, thereby prolonging both systems’ recovery from drought. To analyze watershed response to basin-level groundwater pumping, we propose a modelling framework to understand the resiliency of surface water and groundwater systems using an integrated hydrologic model under transient pumping. The proposed framework incorporates uncertainties in initial conditions to develop robust estimates of restoration times of both surface water and groundwater and quantifies how pumping impacts state variables such as soil moisture. Groundwater pumping impacts over a watershed were also analyzed under different pumping volumes and different potential climate scenarios. Our analyses show that groundwater restoration time is more sensitive to variability in climate forcings as opposed to changes in pumping volumes. After the cessation of pumping, streamflow recovers quickly in comparison to groundwater, which has higher persistence. Pumping impacts on various hydrologic variables were also discussed. Potential for developing optimal conjunctive management plans using seasonal-to-interannual climate forecasts is also discussed.

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Data availability

Gridded observed precipitation and temperature data are available at Ed Maurer’s webpage (http://www.engr.scu.edu/~emaurer/gridded_obs/index_gridded_obs.html). Streamflow and groundwater depth data for the target basins are available at USGS Water Data webpage (http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis). For watershed data sets—watershed boundary shape files, terrain data on digital elevation, land cover classification data—are available at the USGS national map viewer and download platform (http://nationalmap.gov/viewer.html).

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number 1204368. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Engineering Research, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea

    S. B. Seo

  2. Department of Civil Construction, and Environmental Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

    G. Mahinthakumar & A. Sankarasubramanian

  3. Nicholas School of Environment, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    M. Kumar

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  1. S. B. Seo
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  2. G. Mahinthakumar
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  3. A. Sankarasubramanian
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  4. M. Kumar
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Correspondence to S. B. Seo.

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Seo, S.B., Mahinthakumar, G., Sankarasubramanian, A. et al. Assessing the restoration time of surface water and groundwater systems under groundwater pumping. Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess 32, 2741–2759 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00477-018-1570-9

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