Regionalisation of groundwater droughts using hydrograph classification

Groundwater drought is a spatially and temporally variable phenomenon. Here we describe the development and application of a method to regionalize and quantify groundwater drought based on categorisation of Standardised Groundwater level Index (SGI) time series. The categorisation scheme uses non-hierarchical k-means cluster analysis. This has been applied to 74 SGI time series for the period January 1983 to August 2012 for a case study from Lincolnshire, UK. Six SGI time series clusters have been identified. For each cluster a correlation can be established between the mean SGI and a mean Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) associated with an optimal SPI accumulation period, qmax. Based on a comparison of SPI time series for each cluster and SPI estimated for the whole study area, it is inferred that the clusters are largely independent of heterogeneity in the diving meteorology across the study region and are primarily a function of catchment and hydrogeological factors. This inference is supported by the observation that the majority of sites in each cluster are associated with one of three principal aquifers in the study region. The groundwater drought characteristics of the three largest clusters (CL1, CL2 and CL4 that constitute ~80% of the sites) have been analyzed. There is a common linear relationship between drought magnitude and duration for each of three clusters. However, there are differences in the character of the groundwater drought events between the three clusters as a function of autocorrelation of the mean SGI time series for each cluster. For example, CL1 has a relatively short period of significant SGI autocorrelation compared with CL2 (15 and 23 months respectively); CL1 has more than twice the number of drought episodes (39 episodes) than CL2 (15 episodes), and the average and maximum duration of droughts in CL1 (4.6 and 27 months) are less than half those of CL2 (11.3 and 61 months). The drought characteristics of CL4 are intermediate between those of CL1 and CL2. Differences in characteristics between the three clusters are also seen in their response to three major multi-annual droughts that occurred during the analysis period. For example, sites in CL2 with the longest SGI autocorrelation experience the greatest magnitude droughts and are the slowest to recover from drought, with groundwater drought conditions typically persisting at least six months longer than at sites in the other two clusters. Membership of the clusters reflects differences in the autocorrelation of the SGI time series that in turn is shown to be related to unsaturated zone thickness at individual boreholes. This last observation emphasises the importance of catchment and aquifer characteristics as (non-trivial) controls on groundwater drought hydrographs

Regional analysis of groundwater droughts using hydrograph classification

Groundwater drought is a spatially and temporally variable phenomenon. Here we describe the development of a method to regionally analyse and quantify groundwater drought. The method uses a cluster analysis technique (non-hierarchical k-means) to classify standardised groundwater level hydrographs (the standardised groundwater level index, SGI) prior to analysis of their groundwater drought characteristics, and has been tested using 74 groundwater level time series from Lincolnshire, UK. Using the test data set, six clusters of hydrographs have been identified. For each cluster a correlation can be established between the mean SGI and a mean standardised precipitation index (SPI), where each cluster is associated with a different SPI accumulation period. Based on a comparison of SPI time series for each cluster and for the study area as a whole, it is inferred that the clusters are independent of the driving meteorology and are primarily a function of catchment and hydrogeological factors. This inference is supported by the observation that the majority of sites in each cluster are associated with one of the principal aquifers in the study region. The groundwater drought characteristics of the three largest clusters, which constitute ~ 80 % of the sites, have been analysed. There are differences in the distributions of drought duration, magnitude and intensity of groundwater drought events between the three clusters as a function of autocorrelation of the mean SGI time series for each cluster. In addition, there are differences between the clusters in their response to three major multi-annual droughts that occurred during the analysis period. For example, sites in the cluster with the longest SGI autocorrelation experience the greatest-magnitude droughts and are the slowest to recover from major droughts, with groundwater drought conditions typically persisting at least 6 months longer than at sites in the other clusters. Membership of the clusters is shown to be related to unsaturated zone thickness at individual boreholes. This last observation emphasises the importance of catchment and aquifer characteristics as (non-trivial) controls on groundwater drought hydrographs. The method of analysis is flexible and can be adapted to a wide range of hydrogeological settings while enabling a consistent approach to the quantification of regional differences in response of groundwater to meteorological drought

Spatio-temporal modelling of the status of groundwater droughts

An empirical (geo)statistical modelling scheme is developed to address the challenges of modelling the severity and distribution of groundwater droughts given their spatially and temporally heterogeneous nature and given typically highly irregular groundwater level observations in space and time. The scheme is tested using GWL measurements from 948 observation boreholes across the Chalk aquifer (UK) to estimate monthly groundwater drought status from 1960 to 2013. For each borehole, monthly GWLs are simulated using empirical mixed models where the fixed effects are based on applying an impulse response function to the local monthly precipitation. Modelled GWLs are standardised using the Standardised Groundwater Index (SGI) and the monthly SGI values interpolated across the aquifer to produce spatially distributed monthly maps of SGI drought status for 54 years for the Chalk. The mixed models include fewer parameters than comparable lumped parameter groundwater models while explaining a similar proportion (more than 65%) of GWL variation. In addition, the empirical modelling approach enables confidence bounds on the predicted GWLs and SGI values to be estimated without the need for prior information about catchment or aquifer parameters. The results of the modelling scheme are illustrated for three major episodes of multi-annual drought (1975–1976; 1988–1992; 2011–2012). They agree with previous documented analyses of the groundwater droughts while providing for the first time a systematic, spatially coherent characterisation of the events. The scheme is amenable to use in near real time to provide short term forecasts of groundwater drought status if suitable forecasts of the driving meteorology are available

Temporal interpolation of groundwater level hydrographs for regional drought analysis using mixed models

Large-scale studies of the spatial and temporal variation of groundwater drought status require complete inventories of groundwater levels on regular time steps from many sites so that a standardised drought index can be calculated for each site. However, groundwater levels are often measured sporadically, and inventories include missing or erroneous data. A flexible and efficient modelling framework is developed to fill gaps and regularise data in such inventories. It uses linear mixed models to account for seasonal variation, long-term trends and responses to precipitation and temperature over different temporal scales. The only data required to estimate the models are the groundwater level measurements and freely available gridded weather products. The contribution of each of the four types of trends at a site can be determined and thus the causes of temporal variation of groundwater levels can be interpreted. Validation reveals that the models explain a substantial proportion of groundwater level variation and that the uncertainty of the predictions is accurately quantified. The computation for each site takes less than 130 s and requires little supervision. Hence, the approach is suitable to be upscaled to represent the variation of groundwater levels in large datasets consisting of thousands of boreholes

Multi-annual droughts in the English Lowlands: a review of their characteristics and climate drivers in the winter half-year

The English Lowlands is a relatively dry, densely populated region in the south-east of the UK in which water is used intensively. Consequently, parts of the region are water-stressed and face growing water resource pressures. The region is heavily dependent on groundwater and particularly vulnerable to long, multi-annual droughts primarily associated with dry winters. Despite this vulnerability, the atmospheric drivers of multi-annual droughts in the region are poorly understood, an obstacle to developing appropriate drought management strategies, including monitoring and early warning systems. To advance our understanding, we assess known key climate drivers in the winter half-year (October–March) and their likely relationships with multi-annual droughts in the region. We characterise historic multi-annual drought episodes back to 1910 for the English Lowlands using various meteorological and hydrological data sets. Multi-annual droughts are identified using a gridded precipitation series for the entire region, and refined using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), Standardized Streamflow Index (SSI) and Standardized Groundwater level Index (SGI) applied to regional-scale river flow and groundwater time series. We explore linkages between a range of potential climatic driving factors and precipitation, river flow and groundwater level indicators in the English Lowlands for the winter half-year. The drivers or forcings include El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the North Atlantic tripole sea surface temperature (SST) pattern, the Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO), solar and volcanic forcing and the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO). As expected, no single driver convincingly explains the occurrence of any multi-annual drought in the historical record. However, we demonstrate, for the first time, an association between La Niña episodes and winter rainfall deficits in some major multi-annual drought episodes in the English Lowlands. We also show significant (albeit relatively weak) links between ENSO and drought indicators applied to river flow and groundwater levels. We also show that some of the other drivers listed above are likely to influence English Lowlands rainfall. We conclude by signposting a direction for this future research effort

Analysis of groundwater drought using a variant of the Standardised Precipitation Index

A new index for standardising groundwater level time series and characterising groundwater droughts, the Standardised Groundwater level Index (SGI), is described. The SGI is a modification of the Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) that accounts for differences in the form and characteristics of precipitation and groundwater level time series. The SGI is estimated using a non-parametric normal scores transform of groundwater level data for each calendar month. These monthly estimates are then merged to form a continuous index. The SGI has been calculated for 14 relatively long, up to 103 yr, groundwater level hydrographs from a variety of aquifers and compared with SPI for the same sites. The SPI accumulation period which leads to the strongest correlation between SPI and SGI, qmax, varies between sites. There is a positive linear correlation between qmax and a measure of the range of significant autocorrelation in the SGI series, mmax. For each site the strongest correlation between SPI and SGI is in the range 0.7 to 0.87, and periods of low values of SGI coincide with previously independently documented droughts. Hence SGI is taken to be a robust and meaningful index of groundwater drought. The maximum length of groundwater droughts defined by SGI is an increasing function of mmax, meaning that relatively long groundwater droughts are generally more prevalent at sites where SGI has a relatively long autocorrelation range. Based on correlations between mmax, average unsaturated zone thickness and aquifer hydraulic diffusivity, the source of autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be dependent on aquifer flow and storage characteristics. For fractured aquifers, such as the Cretaceous Chalk, autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be primarily related to autocorrelation in the recharge time series, while in granular aquifers, such as the Permo-Triassic Sandstones, autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be primarily a function of intrinsic aquifer characteristics. These results highlight the need to take into account the hydrogeological context of groundwater monitoring sites when designing and interpreting data from groundwater drought monitoring networks

Analysis of groundwater drought building on the standardised precipitation index approach

A new index for standardising groundwater level time series and characterising groundwater droughts, the Standardised Groundwater level Index (SGI), is described. The SGI builds on the Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) to account for differences in the form and characteristics of groundwater level and precipitation time series. The SGI is estimated using a non-parametric normal scores transform of groundwater level data for each calendar month. These monthly estimates are then merged to form a continuous index. The SGI has been calculated for 14 relatively long, up to 103 yr, groundwater level hydrographs from a variety of aquifers and compared with SPI for the same sites. The relationship between SGI and SPI is site specific and the SPI accumulation period which leads to the strongest correlation between SGI and SPI, qmax, varies between sites. However, there is a consistent positive linear correlation between a measure of the range of significant autocorrelation in the SGI series, mmax, and qmax across all sites. Given this correlation between SGI mmax and SPI qmax, and given that periods of low values of SGI can be shown to coincide with previously independently documented droughts, SGI is taken to be a robust and meaningful index of groundwater drought. The maximum length of groundwater droughts defined by SGI is an increasing function of mmax, meaning that relatively long groundwater droughts are generally more prevalent at sites where SGI has a relatively long autocorrelation range. Based on correlations between mmax, average unsaturated zone thickness and aquifer hydraulic diffusivity, the source of autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be dependent on dominant aquifer flow and storage characteristics. For fractured aquifers, such as the Cretaceous Chalk, autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be primarily related to autocorrelation in the recharge time series, while in granular aquifers, such as the Permo–Triassic sandstones, autocorrelation in SGI is inferred to be primarily a function of intrinsic saturated flow and storage properties of aquifer. These results highlight the need to take into account the hydrogeological context of groundwater monitoring sites when designing and interpreting data from groundwater drought monitoring networks

Historic reconstructions of monthly groundwater levels for 54 UK boreholes (1891-2015)

This dataset is a model output created using the BGS AquiMod model. It provides monthly groundwater level relative to the Ordnance Datum (maOD) from 1891 to 2015, reconstructed for 54 observation boreholes across the UK. Based on the Generalised Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) methodology, 90th percentile and 10th percentile confidence bounds have been estimated and are given for each of reconstructed groundwater level time series

Historic Standardised Groundwater level Index (SGI) for 54 UK boreholes (1891-2015)

Monthly Standardised Groundwater level Index (SGI) for observation boreholes across the UK from 1891 to 2015, based on reconstructed groundwater level time series (Bloomfield et al., 2018; https://doi.org/10.5285/ccfded8f-c8dc-4a24-8338-5af94dbfcc16). Standardised groundwater levels have been estimated using a non-parametric normal scores transform of groundwater level data for each calendar month. Probability estimates of an SGI being less than 0, -1, -1.5 and -2 are also provided