A conceptual model for the analysis of multi-stressors in linked groundwater–surface water systems

Abstract

Groundwater and surface water are often closely coupled and are both under the influence of multiple stressors. Stressed groundwater systems may lead to a poor ecological status of surface waters but to date no conceptual framework to analyse linked multi-stressed groundwater - surface water systems has been developed. In this paper, a framework is proposed showing the effect of groundwater on surface waters in multiple stressed systems. This framework will be illustrated by applying it to four European catchments, the Odense, Denmark, the Regge and Dinkel, Netherlands, and the Thames, UK, and by assessing its utility in analysing the propagation or buffering of multi-stressors through groundwater to surface waters in these catchments. It is shown that groundwater affects surface water flow, nutrients and temperature, and can both propagate stressors towards surface waters and buffer the effect of stressors in space and time. The effect of groundwater on drivers and states depends on catchment characteristics, stressor combinations, scale and management practises. The proposed framework shows how groundwater in lowland catchments acts as a bridge between stressors and their effects within surface waters. It shows water managers how their management areas might be influenced by groundwater, and helps them to include this important, but often overlooked part of the water cycle in their basin management plans. The analysis of the study catchments also revealed a lack of data on the temperature of both groundwater and surface water, while it is an important parameter considering future climate warming.

Aged streams: Time lags of nitrate, chloride and tritium assessed by Dynamic Groundwater Flow Tracking

“…The dynamic TTDs for the Springendalse Beek catchment were calculated using forward particle tracking on a high-resolution spatially distributed groundwater flow model following the method described by Kaandorp et al (2018a). A concise description 105 of the method is given here and more details are found in Kaandorp et al (2018a).…”

“…The dynamic TTDs for the Springendalse Beek catchment were calculated using forward particle tracking on a high-resolution spatially distributed groundwater flow model following the method described by Kaandorp et al (2018a). A concise description 105 of the method is given here and more details are found in Kaandorp et al (2018a). Groundwater flow was calculated using an existing finite-difference groundwater flow model (MODFLOW, Harbaugh, 2005) created and calibrated on groundwater heads and validated with both groundwater heads and river discharge in earlier studies (Hendriks et al, 2014;Kuijper et al, 2012).…”

Assessing surface water–groundwater interactions in a complex river‐floodplain wetland‐isolated lake system

“…Surface water bodies such as rivers, lakes, and wetlands are connected to their underlying groundwater in most types of landscapes (Winter, ). Natural exchanges between surface water and groundwater can strongly affect physical hydrological processes (Karan, Sebok, & Engesgaard, ; Winter, Harvey, Franke, & Alley, ), properties (Hayashi & Rosenberry, ; Jin et al, ), and the ecological behaviour of both water bodies (Hanrock, Boulton, & Humphreys, ; Kaandorp et al, ). The potential impacts of climate change and human activities on surface and groundwater resources increase the urgency for reliable assessment of surface water–groundwater interactions (Hutchins et al, ; Smerdon, ).…”

Application of multi-method approach to assess groundwater–surface water interactions, for catchment management

“…Studies conducted globally continue to indicate the combined use of multiple methods for assessing GW-SW interactions is most plausible due to the compensation of the spatial and temporal shortfalls of other methods (Binley et al 2013;Cao et al 2012;Cey et al 1998;Fleckenstein et al 2010;Kaandorp et al 2018;Kakuchi et al 2012;Kalbus et al 2006;Petelet-Giraud et al 2007;Yang et al 2014).This study applied a multiple methods to assess GW-SW interaction by estimating groundwater fluxes using the automated base flow separation, while GW-SW quality characterization was done using hydro-chemical analysis.…”