Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought

Predicting the next major drought is of paramount interest to water managers globally. Estimating the onset of groundwater drought is of particular importance, as groundwater resources are often assumed to be more resilient when surface water resources begin to fail. A potential source of long-term...

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Published in:Hydrology and Earth System Sciences
Main Authors: Rust, William, Holman, Ian, Bloomfield, John, Cuthbert, Mark, Corstanje, Ron
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: European Geosciences Union (EGU) / Copernicus Publications 2019
Subjects:
Online Access:https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019
https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf
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spelling ftunivcardiff:oai:https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk:125041 2023-05-15T17:29:42+02:00 Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought Rust, William Holman, Ian Bloomfield, John Cuthbert, Mark Corstanje, Ron 2019-08-08 application/pdf https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/ https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf en eng European Geosciences Union (EGU) / Copernicus Publications https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf Rust, William, Holman, Ian, Bloomfield, John, Cuthbert, Mark https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/view/cardiffauthors/A23100543.html orcid:0000-0001-6721-022X orcid:0000-0001-6721-022X and Corstanje, Ron 2019. Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences and Discussions 23 (8) , pp. 3233-3245. 10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 file https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf doi:10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 cc_by CC-BY Article PeerReviewed 2019 ftunivcardiff https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 2022-10-27T22:48:09Z Predicting the next major drought is of paramount interest to water managers globally. Estimating the onset of groundwater drought is of particular importance, as groundwater resources are often assumed to be more resilient when surface water resources begin to fail. A potential source of long-term forecasting is offered by possible periodic controls on groundwater level via teleconnections with oscillatory ocean–atmosphere systems. However, relationships between large-scale climate systems and regional to local-scale rainfall, evapotranspiration (ET) and groundwater are often complex and non-linear so that the influence of long-term climate cycles on groundwater drought remains poorly understood. Furthermore, it is currently unknown whether the absolute contribution of multi-annual climate variability to total groundwater storage is significant. This study assesses the extent to which multi-annual variability in groundwater can be used to indicate the timing of groundwater droughts in the UK. Continuous wavelet transforms show how repeating teleconnection-driven 7-year and 16–32-year cycles in the majority of groundwater sites from all the UK's major aquifers can systematically control the recurrence of groundwater drought; and we provide evidence that these periodic modes are driven by teleconnections. Wavelet reconstructions demonstrate that multi-annual periodicities of the North Atlantic Oscillation, known to drive North Atlantic meteorology, comprise up to 40 % of the total groundwater storage variability. Furthermore, the majority of UK recorded droughts in recent history coincide with a minimum phase in the 7-year NAO-driven cycles in groundwater level, providing insight into drought occurrences on a multi-annual timescale. Long-range groundwater drought forecasts via climate teleconnections present transformational opportunities to drought prediction and its management across the North Atlantic region. Article in Journal/Newspaper North Atlantic North Atlantic oscillation Cardiff University: ORCA (Online Research @ Cardiff) Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 23 8 3233 3245
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collection Cardiff University: ORCA (Online Research @ Cardiff)
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language English
description Predicting the next major drought is of paramount interest to water managers globally. Estimating the onset of groundwater drought is of particular importance, as groundwater resources are often assumed to be more resilient when surface water resources begin to fail. A potential source of long-term forecasting is offered by possible periodic controls on groundwater level via teleconnections with oscillatory ocean–atmosphere systems. However, relationships between large-scale climate systems and regional to local-scale rainfall, evapotranspiration (ET) and groundwater are often complex and non-linear so that the influence of long-term climate cycles on groundwater drought remains poorly understood. Furthermore, it is currently unknown whether the absolute contribution of multi-annual climate variability to total groundwater storage is significant. This study assesses the extent to which multi-annual variability in groundwater can be used to indicate the timing of groundwater droughts in the UK. Continuous wavelet transforms show how repeating teleconnection-driven 7-year and 16–32-year cycles in the majority of groundwater sites from all the UK's major aquifers can systematically control the recurrence of groundwater drought; and we provide evidence that these periodic modes are driven by teleconnections. Wavelet reconstructions demonstrate that multi-annual periodicities of the North Atlantic Oscillation, known to drive North Atlantic meteorology, comprise up to 40 % of the total groundwater storage variability. Furthermore, the majority of UK recorded droughts in recent history coincide with a minimum phase in the 7-year NAO-driven cycles in groundwater level, providing insight into drought occurrences on a multi-annual timescale. Long-range groundwater drought forecasts via climate teleconnections present transformational opportunities to drought prediction and its management across the North Atlantic region.
format Article in Journal/Newspaper
author Rust, William
Holman, Ian
Bloomfield, John
Cuthbert, Mark
Corstanje, Ron
spellingShingle Rust, William
Holman, Ian
Bloomfield, John
Cuthbert, Mark
Corstanje, Ron
Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
author_facet Rust, William
Holman, Ian
Bloomfield, John
Cuthbert, Mark
Corstanje, Ron
author_sort Rust, William
title Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
title_short Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
title_full Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
title_fullStr Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
title_full_unstemmed Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
title_sort understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought
publisher European Geosciences Union (EGU) / Copernicus Publications
publishDate 2019
url https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019
https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf
genre North Atlantic
North Atlantic oscillation
genre_facet North Atlantic
North Atlantic oscillation
op_relation https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf
Rust, William, Holman, Ian, Bloomfield, John, Cuthbert, Mark https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/view/cardiffauthors/A23100543.html orcid:0000-0001-6721-022X orcid:0000-0001-6721-022X and Corstanje, Ron 2019. Understanding the potential of climate teleconnections to project future groundwater drought. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences and Discussions 23 (8) , pp. 3233-3245. 10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019 file https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/125041/1/Rust_etal_HESS_2019_GWteleconnections.pdf
doi:10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019
op_rights cc_by
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op_doi https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-3233-2019
container_title Hydrology and Earth System Sciences
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