Temperatures in the arctic and subarctic are rising at more than twice the rate of the global average, driving the accelerated thawing of permafrost across the region. The impacts of permafrost degradation have been studied in the discontinuous permafrost zone at Umiujaq, in northern Quebec, Canada, for over 30 years, but the effects of changing land cover on groundwater recharge are not well understood. The water table fluctuation method was used to compute groundwater recharge using 4 years of water level data and soil moisture readings from five field sites characteristic of different stages of permafrost degradation and vegetation invasion. Results indicate that as vegetation grows taller, groundwater recharge increases, likely due to increased snow thickness. Results were then combined with a preexisting conceptual model that describes the evolution from tundra to shrubland and forests to create a new model for describing how groundwater recharge is affected by landscape evolution.
Island groundwater resources often form freshwater lenses overlying saline groundwater. When water is withdrawn from a freshwater lens by a pumping well, saline groundwater migrates upwards toward the well. This vertical seawater intrusion process, also called saltwater upconing, is a major concern when managing well fields. Freshwater lenses of island aquifers have been described as being more vulnerable than continental coastal aquifers, since vertical migration distances associated with upconing are shorter than horizontal ones (Jiao &
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