Affiliation:
1. Computational Geomechanics Group, College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QF, UK
Abstract
Climate change, sea level rise, over-pumping and saltwater intrusion present some of the future challenges of water resources management in coastal areas. Over-abstraction is considered one of the main causes of seawater intrusion and the rise in sea levels accelerates the intrusion. With the combined impact of sea level rise and over-pumping the problem becomes exacerbated and requires urgent solutions. Previous studies have mainly focused on the study of impact of sea level rise or over-abstraction on seawater intrusion separately and their combined effects have not been studied in the literature. This paper presents application of a coupled transient density-dependent finite element model to simulate seawater intrusion in coastal aquifers and investigates the individual and combined effects of likely sea level rise and over-pumping on seawater intrusion. Three scenarios are considered: rise in sea levels due to climate change, decline in groundwater table due to over-pumping and combination of sea level rise and over-pumping. The results show that, in the case study considered in this paper, the rise in the sea level moved the transition zone inland by about 5%. However, the combination of sea level rise and over-pumping resulted in further inland movement of the transition zone (about 8%). The amount of intrusion greatly depends on the depth, size and properties of the aquifer. While the intrusion is a few metres in a small aquifer, it could be several kilometres in a large aquifer.
Subject
Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law,Atmospheric Science,Water Science and Technology,Global and Planetary Change
Cited by
26 articles.
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