AT3-6: Groundwater resources: present, sustainability and perspectives.

Conveners: Daniele Tardani, Universidad de O’Higgins. Linda Daniele, Universidad de Chile. Matías Taucare, Universidad de Chile. Sarah Leray, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Etienne Bresciani, Universidad de O’Higgins. daniele.tardani.uoh.cl

Description: Groundwater represents the most important reservoir of the planet’s unfrozen fresh water. Groundwater supplies drinking water, agriculture and livestock,industrial processes, mining activity, and contributes to many ecosystems sustainability. During the last decades the population growth, urbanization, and climate change have increased and intensified the water demand. Based on the “United Nations Water Development Report 2022”, approximately 70% of global groundwater withdrawals, and even more in arid and semi-arid regions, are due to food production, highlighting the global dependence on this resource. Under the current climate change and droughts scenarios, where surface water storage and quality depletion increases, the reliance on groundwater has drastically risen, broadening the needs of advanced strategies for a sustainable use of groundwater resources. 

We expect contributions on the current state of groundwater, aquifers and methodologies for the management of hydrogeological basins. This includes hydrogeological and hydrological studies, through numerical methods (recharge estimation, flow and reactive transport models), geochemical and geophysical methods to understand the conceptual models of groundwater recharge and flow, resource management, basin balance, overexploitation and contamination of aquifers, in different climatic contexts to provide an updated vision of this resource.