Influence of Groundwater Extraction Costs and Resource Depletion Limits on Simulated Global Nonrenewable Water Withdrawals Over the Twenty-First Century

Sean W.D. Turner, Mohamad Hejazi, Catherine Yonkofski, Son H. Kim, Page Kyle

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

70 Scopus citations

Abstract

Future rates of global groundwater depletion will depend on the economic and environmental viability of extracting water from increasingly stressed aquifers. Here we analyze global groundwater depletion by considering these factors explicitly. Global gridded groundwater availability and extraction cost data are aggregated to produce nonrenewable resource supply curves for 235 major river basins and geopolitical regions. These resources are then exposed to dynamically generated demands for water in a fully coupled, multisectoral, global simulation. As groundwater head levels drop, imposing greater capital and operating costs to bring water to the surface, modeled water use sectors are able to deploy a range of supply- and demand-driven adaptive responses. Results demonstrate large sensitivity in global groundwater depletion rates to adjustments in resource exploitability. Extraction costs moderate demands for nonrenewable water substantially, resulting in the onset of a decline in global groundwater depletion rates within the twenty-first century. New groundwater depletion hot spots may emerge as crop producers abandon overexploited basins and expand croplands in regions with cheaper, more plentiful water resources.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)123-135
Number of pages13
JournalEarth's Future
Volume7
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2019
Externally publishedYes

Funding

The groundwater cost and availability data applied in this study are described in the supporting information. Nonrenewable cost‐availability supply curves aggregated to GCAM basins are included in csv format. This research was supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy Biological and Environmental Research through the Integrated Assessment Research Program. PNNL is operated for DOE by Battelle Memorial Institute under contract DE‐AC05‐76RL01830. The groundwater cost and availability data applied in this study are described in the supporting information. Nonrenewable cost-availability supply curves aggregated to GCAM basins are included in csv format. This research was supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy Biological and Environmental Research through the Integrated Assessment Research Program. PNNL is operated for DOE by Battelle Memorial Institute under contract DE-AC05-76RL01830.

FundersFunder number
U.S. Department of Energy Biological and Environmental Research
BattelleDE-AC05-76RL01830
Office of Science
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

    Keywords

    • global water resources
    • groundwater depletion
    • integrated assessment modeling
    • water-energy-food nexus

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Influence of Groundwater Extraction Costs and Resource Depletion Limits on Simulated Global Nonrenewable Water Withdrawals Over the Twenty-First Century'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this