Economic Commission for Europe inventory of transboundary ground water in Europe

In Europe, a long history of cooperation over transboundary rivers--most notably the Rhine and Danube rivers--exists. To help foster cooperation and communication vis-à-vis transboundary ground water, the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), as part of its ground water program, conducted a survey on transboundary aquifers in Europe. The survey produced 25 responses from 37 countries and identified 89 transboundary aquifers. Respondents reported on the degree of ground water use within their own boundaries, transboundary aspects (agreements, joint commissions, etc.) of ground water, and transboundary aquifers themselves. The inventory proved useful, but a number of problems were identified: different map scales and symbols, difficulty in identifying transboundary aquifers, inconsistent labeling of aquifers, and data discrepancies. The UNECE ground water program also drafted guidelines for monitoring and assessment of transboundary ground water. These guidelines are not legally binding but have been adopted by 25 countries, deal mainly with monitoring and assessment, and are being implemented through a number of pilot projects. Other organizations-the United Nations Scientific, Educational and Cultural Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization, the International Association of Hydrogeologists, and the European Union--are all supporting the investigation of transboundary aquifers in an effort to facilitate data sharing and coordinated management of these valuable resources.     

Integrated water management in shared water resources: The EU Water Framework Directive implementation in Greece

The political dimension of water becomes highly important not only because of its scarcity, but also as a result of its sharing across national boundaries. Approximately 40% of the global population lives in transboundary water basins, 55% of which are located in Europe, emphasizing the need for cooperation and harmonization of policies. In order to better handle major water problems Europe have adopted the new EU Water Framework Directive 2000/60 the implementation of which is further discussed. Especially in Greece, management of transboundary rivers is of major importance, since roughly 25% of the country’s renewable resources are “imported”. However, lack of integrated approaches and legal agreements as well as administrative shortcomings, make transboundary cooperation and management a hard task. This study refers to 4 shared basins in Northern Greece and demonstrates the problems that occur for their sustainable management.     

Transboundary water problems and approaches to their solution: 1. Formation of agreements

Conflict situations in transboundary water use and the associated problems of harmonization of the interests of the users who claim the resources of transboundary water bodies. Mechanisms are proposed for the harmonization of the interests of states using transboundary water bodies in the absence of agreements regarding joint management strategies. The harmonization is being carried out with the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of water resources under stochastic conditions taken into account.     

Institutional,regulatory, and managerial aspects of the development of transboundary water bodies and streams in Russia

The number of international agreements on transboundary water bodies and streams was found to increase rapidly in the late XX and early XXI century. The institutional and regulatory conditions required for solving the problems of international rivers and lakes are discussed. A system of governmental bodies in Russia, dealing with the use and protection of transboundary water bodies and streams is described. The international cooperation of Russia in the management of transboundary water bodies and streams is shown.     

GRACE估算陆地水储量季节和年际变化

利用最新公布的GRACE GFZ RL04数据,分析了2003年1月～2007年12月全球27条流域和陆地水储量的季节性和年际变化.结果表明,相近流域季节性变化相位接近.2003年1月～2007年12月陆地水储量季节性变化为1572.4 km3,其中变化最大流域为亚马逊河,其次分别为鄂毕河、尼罗河和尼日尔河等流域.5年来 GRACE陆地水储量的年际变化为-75.4±40.3 km3/a,其中亚马逊河、勒拿河和马更些河等流域的年际变化呈现正增长,而刚果河、密西西比河、恒河、育空河和雅鲁藏布江等流域则相反.GRACE与GLDAS数据均表明2006年后陆地水储量年际变化存在明显增加.     

Transboundary aquifers: a global program to assess, evaluate, and develop policy

Transboundary aquifers are as important a component of global water resource systems as are transboundary rivers; yet, their recognition in international water policy and legislation is very limited. Existing international conventions and agreements barely address aquifers and their resources. To rectify this deficiency, the International Association of Hydrogeologists and UNESCO's International Hydrological Programme have established the Internationally Shared (transboundary) Aquifer Resource Management (ISARM) Programme. This multiagency cooperative program has launched a number of global and regional initiatives. These are designed to delineate and analyze transboundary aquifer systems and to encourage riparian states to work cooperatively toward mutually beneficial and sustainable aquifer development. The agencies participating in ISARM include international and regional organizations (e.g., Organization of American States, United Nations Environment Programme, United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, Food and Agriculture Organization, and South African Development Community). Using outputs of case studies, the ISARM Programme is building scientific, legal, environmental, socioeconomic, and institutional guidelines and recommendations to aid sharing nations in the management of their transboundary aquifers. Since its start in 2000, the program has completed inventories of transboundary aquifers in the Americas and Africa, and several ISARM case studies have commenced.     

China's Transboundary Groundwater Cooperation in the Context of Emerging Transboundary Aquifer Law

China shares more than 20 transboundary aquifers with its coaquifer states, but they have not exploited their transboundary groundwater resources, and these resources have not been governed by any international agreements. Given the close interaction between surface water and groundwater, and the growing demands for transboundary groundwater in China and its coaquifer states, there is increasing necessity for these countries to undertake international cooperation on this issue. This article overviews China's transboundary aquifers, reviews the duty to cooperate on China's transboundary groundwater as well as the emerging transboundary aquifer law. It concludes by providing some proposals on international cooperation in this context, based on the two theories of international water law—limited territorial sovereignty and common interests, taking into account the practicability of China's cooperation with its coaquifer states. The author suggests that China cooperates with its coaquifer states through such means as the exchange of data and information, joint monitoring, the conclusion of bilateral or multilateral aquifer agreements, the establishment of joint management mechanisms, and international technical cooperation.     

Transboundary water problems and approaches to their solution: 2. Revision of agreements

Mechanisms are proposed for the harmonization of interests of states using transboundary water bodies in the cases where agreements on joint management strategies are to be revised. The harmonization is being carried out taking into account the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of water resources under stochastic conditions. The functioning of water bodies is considered under static conditions and in discrete time. The harmonization takes place within a manageable market of water resources.     

DAM IMPACTS ON AND RESTORATION OF AN ALLUVIAL RIVER-RIO GRANDE, NEW MEXICO

1 INTRODUCTION The construction of more than 75,000 dams and reservoirs on rivers in the United States (Graf, 1999) has resulted in alteration of the hydrology, geometry, and sediment flow in many of the river channels downstream of dams. Additionally, hydrologic and geomorphic impacts lead to changes in the physical habitat affecting both the flora and fauna of the riparian and aquatic environments. Legislation for protection of endangered species as well as heightened interest in ma…     

Geochemical tracers to evaluate hydrogeologic controls on river salinization

The salinization of rivers, as indicated by salinity increases in the downstream direction, is characteristic of arid and semiarid regions throughout the world. Historically, salinity increases have been attributed to various mechanisms, including (1) evaporation and concentration during reservoir storage, irrigation, and subsequent reuse; (2) displacement of shallow saline ground water during irrigation; (3) erosion and dissolution of natural deposits; and/or (4) inflow of deep saline and/or geothermal ground water (ground water with elevated water temperature). In this study, investigation of salinity issues focused on identification of relative salinity contributions from anthropogenic and natural sources in the Lower Rio Grande in the New Mexico-Texas border region. Based on the conceptual model of the system, the various sources of water and, therefore, salinity to the Lower Rio Grande were identified, and a sampling plan was designed to characterize these sources. Analysis results for boron (delta(11)B), sulfur (delta(34)S), oxygen (delta(18)O), hydrogen (delta(2)H), and strontium ((87)Sr/(86)Sr) isotopes, as well as basic chemical data, confirmed the hypothesis that the dominant salinity contributions are from deep ground water inflow to the Rio Grande. The stable isotopic ratios identified the deep ground water inflow as distinctive, with characteristic isotopic signatures. These analyses indicate that it is not possible to reproduce the observed salinization by evapotranspiration and agricultural processes alone. This investigation further confirms that proper application of multiple isotopic and geochemical tracers can be used to identify and constrain multiple sources of solutes in complex river systems.     

Asymmetric abstraction and allocation: the Israeli-Palestinian water pumping record

The increased attention given to international transboundary aquifers may be nowhere more pressing than on the western bank of the Jordan River. Hydropolitical analysis of six decades of Israeli and Palestinian pumping records reveals how ground water abstraction rates are as asymmetrical as are water allocations. The particular hydrogeology of the region, notably the variability in depth to ground water, variations in ground water quality, and the vulnerability of the aquifer, also affect the outcome. The records confirm previously drawn conclusions of the influence of the agricultural lobby in maintaining a supply-side water management paradigm. Comparison of water consumption rates divulges that water consumed by all sectors of the farming-based Palestinian economy is less than half of Israeli domestic consumption. The overwhelming majority of "reserve" flows from wet years are sold at subsidized rates to the Israeli agricultural sector, while very minor amounts are sold at normal rates to the Palestinian side for drinking water. An apparent coevolution of water resource variability and politics serves to explain increased Israeli pumping prior to negotiations in the early 1990s. The abstraction record from the Western Aquifer Basin discloses that the effective limit set by the terms of the 1995 Oslo II Agreement is regularly violated by the Israeli side, thereby putting the aquifer at risk. The picture that emerges is one of a transboundary water regime that is much more exploitative than cooperative and that risks spoiling the resource as it poisons international relations.     

Problems of dependable water use in the transboundary Ural River basin

The regional specifics of water use in the transboundary basin of the Ural R. are studied. The diverse problems of dependable water use in the region are caused by the interaction of natural and anthropogenic factors. Considering the space and time variations of river runoff, a possible approach to solving water use problem is runoff regulation. To effectively solve the problem of water use requires the search for an organizational and legal form of institutional interaction within the transboundary basin of the Ural R.     

A framework for resolving the transboundary water allocation conflict conundrum

This paper describes a methodology for resolving transboundary water disputes that arise when people/states/nations sharing a resource that crosses legal/political jurisdictions disagree about the use of the resource. Laws and treaties written in an attempt to settle disputes are frequently neither enforced nor effective, and disagreements continue. Crises, arising through resource overuse or shortages, worsen the conflict and typically result in further discord, lawsuits, depletion of the resource, and even open-armed hostility. Many water management experts call for either private/market-based or state/command-and-control resource management systems, but these eventually break down during crisis. The crises therefore necessitate the adoption of a more effective institutional arrangement to address and resolve present and future problems. A better alternative to management by private or state entities and the resolution of conflicts by the mere application of law is a cooperative approach. The Rowland-Ostrom Framework, introduced in this paper, incorporates Ostrom's eight design principles for sustainable common pool resource management within the context of crisis that involves an urgent threat to the quantity or quality of a resource such as water, as described by the author. This paper demonstrates that although established 15 years ago, Ostrom's design principles remain applicable today for effective, sustainable transboundary water management, and the Rowland-Ostrom Framework is a model for the equitable use of shared water resources throughout the world.     

Investigation and water management aspects of a Hungarian-Ukrainian transboundary aquifer

In the framework of an EEA Norway and EU grants project involving industrial and scientific partners, complex hydrogeological investigation and groundwater modeling of a regional transboundary aquifer between Hungary and Ukraine were carried out in 2010. To find a common groundwater management strategy, this challenging cooperation work was completed by an EU country and a non-EU country. This pilot project demonstrated how the EU Water Framework Directive and some other legal aspects can be applied for a regional scale transboundary aquifer between Hungary and Ukraine. The transboundary aquifers play significant role in Hungary because the country land is mainly located in a deep and closed basin called Carpathian. After finalizing the watershed management plans in 2009, it turned out that 40 from the total 185 groundwater bodies are classified as transboundary in Hungary. The authors were involved to participate in an earlier NATO Science for Peace Project, which investigated a transboundary aquifer between Hungary and Romania some years ago. The special experience gained that time was utilized in the current project.     

Water in Kazakhstan,a key in Central Asian water management

Central Asia is one of the regions with the highest probability of conflicts over water. Kazakhstan is the main Central Asian economic power and therefore it is important to understand how the country’s water management policy is influencing water availability in the other Central Asian states. Already, the Central Asian economies are developing under increasing water deficiency, resulting in developmental problems. The main reasons for this are increasing political tensions and worsening ecological and socio-economic conditions. Kazakhstan was the first country in Central Asia to develop the pre-requisites for a transition towards integrated water resources management (IWRM). Therefore, Kazakhstan has potential to lead the development of transboundary water integration between all Central Asian states. A scenario for successful regional cooperation on water management in Central Asia involves establishing legal mechanisms for water management following international water law, assistance by international agencies and donors, and integrated social, economic and environmental methodology.     

Cartographie des accidents régionaux et identification de leur rôle dans l'hydrodynamique souterraine en zone de socle. Cas de la région de Dimbokro-Bongouanou (Côte d'Ivoire)

Abstract

This paper reviews current knowledge of the potential impacts of climate change on water resources in Africa and the possible limits, barriers or opportunities for adaptation to climate change in internationally-shared river basins. Africa faces significant challenges to water resources management in the form of high variability and regional scarcity, set within the context of generally weak institutional capacity. Management is further challenged by the transboundary nature of many of its river basins. Climate change, despite uncertainty about the detail of its impacts on water resources, is likely to exacerbate many of these challenges. River basins, and the riparian states that share them, differ in their capacities to adapt. Without appropriate cooperation adaptation may be limited and uneven. Further research to examine the factors and processes that are important for cooperation to lead to positive adaptation outcomes and the increased adaptive capacity of water management institutions is suggested.     

The status of transboundary rivers in Turkey

Turkey, like many countries today, faces challenges in efficiently developing and managing its water resources while working to maintain water quality and protect the environment. This situation causes that the transboundary rivers in Turkey have been the most important. In this study, issues relating the development and management of the transboundary rivers of Turkey are discussed. For this purpose, this paper analyses the general characteristics, climate and water resources, current water usage status, and energy potential of the transboundary rivers, namely Euphrates-Tigris, Çoruh, Orontes, Kura-Arax, and Maritza. In addition, two significance development plans, which are the Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP) and the Çoruh River Development Plan located in the transboundary rivers, are evaluated. The total feasible hydropower potential of projects reaches 37896 GW h/yr when all planned projects are completed. This value corresponds to 16.5% of the annual electric energy production of the Turkey in 2011. The GAP will also irrigate 1058509 hectare of land area.     

Quantifying temporal variations in water resources of a vulnerable middle eastern transboundary aquifer system

Freshwater resources in the arid Arabian Peninsula, especially transboundary aquifers shared by Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Iraq, are of critical environmental and geopolitical significance. Monthly Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite‐derived gravity field solutions acquired over the expansive Saq transboundary aquifer system were analysed and spatiotemporally correlated with relevant land surface model outputs, remote sensing observations, and field data to quantify temporal variations in regional water resources and to identify the controlling factors affecting these resources. Our results show substantial GRACE‐derived terrestrial water storage (TWS) and groundwater storage (GWS) depletion rates of ?9.05 ± 0.25 mm/year (?4.84 ± 0.13 km³/year) and ?6.52 ± 0.29 mm/year (?3.49 ± 0.15 km³/year), respectively. The rapid decline is attributed to both climatic and anthropogenic factors; observed TWS depletion is partially related to a decline in regional rainfall, while GWS depletions are highly correlated with increasing groundwater extraction for irrigation and observed water level declines in regional supply wells.