Water quality of aquafires are drying/contamination enormously.
Yes. (a) Sea level rise will contaminate groundwater aquifers (chloride contamination) due to saltwater intrusion. This will be a serious problem both at regional and global level since 80% of the world’s population live along the coast and utilize local aquifers for their water supply; (b) increased leaching of water soluble contaminants (nitrates, pesticides, herbicides) into groundwater due to more intense rainfall and intensified irrigation in the future.
Climate change will probably has an impact on groundwater quality, but the relation is not straightforward. Climate change will be associated to changes in precipitation and then in the use of surface water by human. Since in most country the quality of groundwater is degraded due to diffuse ou local pollution transfered from the soil to groundwater (or from surface water to groundwater), you should expect some alterations somewhere. By the way you could also have an increase of salinisation in subsurface aquife due to higher evaporation.
Very good discussion question, I appreciate.
I see another impact of climate change on groundwater quality, based on my experience in Indus Basin Irrigation System, especially in Punjab, Pakistan.
The impact can be due to less availability of surface water (due to high/peak rainfall within short durations, more runoff to downstream area and low recharge to groundwater, a possible aspect of climate change) and resulting more dependency on groundwater.
Groundwater has been recharged from surface water, over millions of years scale. Naturally the upper layer is more fresh and the deeper groundwater is relatively saline, and at certain places it is highly saline.
Thus, with over exploitation of groundwater than earlier, we will try to tap deeper groundwater, which is relatively more saline.
Resultantly, climate change is expected to have adverse impact on groundwater quality.
Yes, Climate Change indirectly affect the quality of groundwater.
And groundwater level directly affected by Climate change.
Yes, climatic change impact the ground water quality. Lower rain fall increases the ionic concentration in the ground water system resulting in more TDS, EC etc, while heavy rain fall in the area results in dilution making ground water quality better.
If the Climate Change is a reality, then it is expected to rise the atmospheric temperature and that in turn can cause variation in the intensity and distribution of rainfall thereby causing floods or drought. This phenomenon can cause changes in groundwater quality as already explained above, but more prominantly in the coastal aquifers.
Well,
The hydrological cycle is most affected by climate factors, and any change in the climate is necessarily reflected on the groundwater which is part of the hydrological cycle in terms of quality and quantity.
Regards
Climate change is predicted to result in erratic weather patterns such as drought in some areas and excessive rainfall in others, and increased activity of hurricanes and storms. You can expect differences in water runoffs, concentration of pollutants, increased ionic and TDS content in surface water - all of which will ultimately get into the aquifer recharge zones thus affecting ground water quality. Additionally, increased global temperatures may result in more water being drawn from the aquifers (for human use) from the top layers resulting in increased salinity of the remaining water in the aquifer.
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