Levels of natural groundwater reservoirs are falling worldwide
Published: Wednesday, Jan 24th 2024, 17:30
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Levels in natural groundwater reservoirs around the world have been falling since 1980. According to a new study with Swiss participation, the rate at which levels have fallen has accelerated in the last two decades.
However, the study published on Wednesday in the journal "Nature" also shows that natural reservoirs can recover with appropriate measures. For the study, the research team from Switzerland, the UK, the USA and Saudi Arabia analyzed data from 170,000 groundwater monitoring wells from around 1,700 groundwater systems around the world over the last 40 years.
The data shows that sharp declines in groundwater levels are widespread in the 21st century, as the researchers wrote in the study. According to the study, the level of around one in ten aquifers, a groundwater-bearing rock layer, fell by half a meter or more per year. In around one in three aquifers, the decline has accelerated over the last four decades. According to the study, dry regions where intensive agriculture is practiced are particularly affected.
Switzerland also affected
Even if Switzerland is not generally threatened by water shortages, falling groundwater levels are also a problem in this country, said the co-author of the study, Hansjörg Seybold, from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich), when asked by the Keystone-SDA news agency.
One example of this is the aquifer in Geneva, which supplies around 700,000 people in the canton and neighboring France with drinking water. Between 1960 and 1970, its level fell drastically because water was pumped out in an uncoordinated manner in both Switzerland and France, as Seybold explained. As a result, some wells dried up.
"However, the Geneva Aquifer is also a good example of how politics and transnational cooperation have been able to stabilize groundwater resources," said Seybold. In order to preserve the shared water supplies, the two countries agreed to add water from the River Arve to the natural groundwater reservoir. According to Seybold, this has stabilized the groundwater level.
©Keystone/SDA
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