21st Century Global Freshwater Security:
Can it Exist and Can Scientists Communicate the Challenges?
Cumulative freshwater losses in California (left), the Middle East (center) and NW India (right) from GRACE, 2002-2014
Famiglietti, 2011
Voss et al., 2013
Rodell et al., 2009
Jay Famiglietti
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, USA
University of Florida, Water Institute 2016 Symposium, February 16, 2016
Overview of today’s talk
• Defining water security
• What are satellites telling us about water availability?
- California (and Florida!), United States, globally
• What are the implications for water sustainability and security?
• Communicating the challenge of water sustainability;
or, the challenge of communicating about water sustainability
Defining water security
• A region’s water security is defined by its ability to provide a reliable
supply of potable water to meet the various needs of its population,
both now and into the future.
• USGS [2010]: the protection of adequate water supplies for food, fiber,
industrial, and residential needs for expanding populations, which
requires maximizing water-use efficiency, developing new supplies,
and protecting water reserves in event of scarcity due to natural,
manmade, or technological hazards.
• U. S. Dept. of State equates water security with the confluence of
water problems (floods, droughts, shortages, poor quality,
environmental degradation) and social challenges (poverty, social
tensions, weak political systems)
What are satellites telling us about water availability?
NASA Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE)
• Launched in 2002
• Functions like a ‘scale in the sky’ that can weigh the
monthly increases or decreases in total water storage in
large (>200,000 km2) regions with an accuracy of 1.5 cm
NASA GRACE Follow-On (GRACE-FO)
To launch in 2017
Monthly Terrestrial Water Storage Changes from GRACE, 2002-2015
grace.jpl.nasa.gov
Animation credit: NASA GSFC SVS and NASA JPL/Caltech
Change in total water storage in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River basins from GRACE
2002-2014
2006
2009
Time series and images computed from NASA JPL Mascons
2013
How do we estimate groundwater storage changes with GRACE?
SLAND = SSNOW + SSW + SSM + SGW
SGW SLAND - SSNOW - SSW - SSM
SLAND
Remove this (SSNOW
+ SSW + SSM) from
SLAND
To isolate this (SGW )
Future prospects for estimating groundwater storage changes from space
SGroundwater STotal - SSnow - SSurface Water - SSoil Moisture
GRACE-FO (2017)
ASO (2013)
SWOT (2020)
SMAP (2015)
Cumulative groundwater depletion in California’s Central Valley from USGS and GRACE
(1962-2014)
After Faunt, 2009, USGS PP 1766
USGS data courtesy of Claudia Faunt
Mapping Groundwater Induced Subsidence Rates
Near El Nido, CA
Subsidence rate,
2007-2011
Slide courtesy of Tom Farr, NASA JPL
Subsidence rate,
May-October 2014
Lessons learned:
California is in a state of chronic water scarcity
• This persistent state is exacerbated and exposed by drought
• It is primarily due to California’s exceptional agricultural productivity
• It is important for the public to grasp this state of affairs because in constrast to
drought, there is no end in sight
Lessons learned:
California is in a state of chronic water scarcity
• This persistent state is exacerbated and exposed by drought
• It is primarily due to California’s exceptional agricultural productivity
• It is important for the public to grasp this state of affairs because in constrast to
drought, there is no end in sight
Water use in our cities may well be sustainable. Agriculture at today’s scale may well
not be.
Given that California grows food for the nation, it may be time to recognize the
‘California’ water problem as a national problem.
There are many ‘solutions’ for our metropolitan regions but fewer for agriculture. It
simply uses too much water.
• Agricultural conservation, efficiency, water pricing and innovation are the key for
now.
• Either we move water to California or we move agriculture out over time.
• We have new groundwater legislation in California, but it is going to take over 25
years to implement.
• Food production due to water scarcity is going to be a major, global problem that
needs our immediate attention
What about the rest of the world?
Groundwater depletion during drought threatens the water
Total water storage anomalies
security of the Colorado River Basin
Castle et al., 2014
‘Accessible’ water storage anomalies
Surface and ground water storage anomalies
GW
SW
Water storage changes in the United States from GRACE
(2002-2015)
after Famiglietti and Rodell, 2013
Map pepared by NASA JPL/Caltech from JPL Mascons
SE Coastal Aquifer Subsurface Water Storage from GRACE, from Richey et al, 2015
N. Florida, Total Water Storage from GRACE
Rodell et al., 2009
Voss et al., 2013
Animation credit
Jay Famiglietti,
Jason Craig, Eric de
Jong, Felix
Landerer, JT
Reager, Mike
Stetson, NASA JPL
Trends in Freshwater Availability from the NASA GRACE Mission
2002-2014
Rodell et al., 2015, in preparation
Greenland ice sheet melting
Alaska glaciers
melting
High latitude precipitation increase
Ukraine drought
Upper Midwest
U.S. flooding
Central Valley
groundwater depletion
Southeastern U.S. drought
High Plains Aquifer
groundwater depletion
Colombia glaciers melting
Orinoco and
Amazon floods
Caspina/Aral
Seas
North China Plain
shrinking
groundwater depletion
Middle East groundwater depletion
North Africa
India/Bangladesh groundwater depletion
groundwater depletion
Indian monsoon
West Africa
floods
Mekong drought
Congo drought
Okavango floods
Peru glaciers melting
Southern Africa
groundwater depletion
Brazil drought
Guarani Aquifer
groundwater depletion
NW Australia
groundwater depletion
Patagonia glaciers melting
Antarctic ice sheet melting
Rodell et al., 2015, in review
mm H2O yr -1
Trends in Groundwater Storage from NASA GRACE Mission (2003-2013)
Richey at al., 2015, Water Resources Research
Trends in Freshwater Availability from the NASA GRACE Mission, 20022014
?
?
?
IPCC AR4, Projected Patterns of Precipitation Change (2090-2099)
Reager et al., 2015, accepted
What are the implications for water sustainability and security?
An international call to action: One pathway towards water security
• Recognition and acceptance: we use more water than we have available
-
Greater agricultural water use efficiency
Dispel the myth of limitless water
• Hydrogeological exploration of the world’s major aquifers
-
Existing estimates of aquifer storage based on coarse assumptions and not
on actual exploration
Current estimates vary by several orders of magnitude
• Conjunctive surface and groundwater use
-
Groundwater depletion results in streamflow depletion
Streamflow diversions limit groundwater recharge
• Meausuring, monitoring, reporting of groundwater quantity and quality
data, and sharing across political boundaries
-
Policies of data denial are becoming obsolete
• Recognize groundwater as a critical element of national and
international water supplies
-
Structure water sharing agreements accordingly
Need to get policy infrastructure in place for peaceable water sharing
We are living in an era of rapid climate change and with it, major
changes in the water cycle
• Our nation, our society and our world are not really prepared for the water,
food and energy future that the work presented today suggests and that
population growth will only exacerbate
• Distinct classes of water ‘haves and have nots’ are emerging due to
- WWDD
- Falling water tables
• Are we prepared to address the
- Social inequites?
- Increased potential for violent conflict and climate refugees?
- Necessary revisions to archaic and arcane domestic water law?
- Need for international, transboundary, legal and civil infrastructure?
Communicating the challenge of water sustainability
Logic might suggest this:
“Once people truly understand the sources of their water supply and how
they are changing, acceptance of the need for action and for protection is far
more likely.”
From ‘Last Call at the Oasis,’ courtesy of Participant Media
Some key thoughts
• Universities must engage the public, environmental decision makers and
elected officials
-
Responsibility or nuisance?
Promotion system must reward efforts in science communication
Students, push your supervisors to get involved
• Hydrologists need to focus and rally around fundamental ‘known
unknowns’ to have real impact
- Consistent, clear and targeted messaging are essential
• Industry leadership (especially food) and private sector engagement is
essential
Communication can take many forms
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
To the general public via lectures, blogs, outreach events, op-eds
To water managers via collaborations, presentations
Via press releases and responsiveness to media queries
State and Federal government via briefings, advising, testimony
Other DC: State Dept, Pentagon, OSTP, CEQ, World Bank
NGO’s and non-profits
As
a community,
need
elevate critical water issues
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For more information | http://jayfamiglietti.com | @JayFamiglietti
The Global Crisis of Vanishing Groundwater, December 10, 2015
Richey et al., Quantifying Global Groundwater Stress and Uncertainty,
Water Resources Research, June, 2015
The Global Groundwater Crisis, Nature Climate Change, October 29, 2014
Can We End the Global Water Crisis? TEDx Talk, May, 2013,
www.thewaterchannel.tv
Last Call at the Oasis, May, 2012
Depleting the Water, November 16, 2014