Cassiraga, Eduardo

Gómez-Hernández, J. Jaime

José Gómez-Alday, Juan

Sanz, David

English

Hydraulic Engineering Repository

Article, Published VersionCassiraga, Eduardo; Sanz, David; José Gómez-Alday, Juan; Gómez-Hernández, J. JaimeGroundwater management in Spain - The Case of theeastern Mancha Aquifer SystemHydrolinkVerfügbar unter/Available at: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11970/109454Vorgeschlagene Zitierweise/Suggested citation:Cassiraga, Eduardo; Sanz, David; José Gómez-Alday, Juan; Gómez-Hernández, J. Jaime(2019): Groundwater management in Spain - The Case of the eastern Mancha AquiferSystem. In: Hydrolink 2019/3. Madrid: International Association for Hydro-EnvironmentEngineering and Research (IAHR). S. 81-83. http://iahr.oss-accelerate.aliyuncs.com/library/HydroLink/HydroLink2019_03_s09ds0a9s8d7sd.pdf.Standardnutzungsbedingungen/Terms of Use:Die Dokumente in HENRY stehen unter der Creative Commons Lizenz CC BY 4.0, sofern keine abweichendenNutzungsbedingungen getroffen wurden. Damit ist sowohl die kommerzielle Nutzung als auch das Teilen, dieWeiterbearbeitung und Speicherung erlaubt. Das Verwenden und das Bearbeiten stehen unter der Bedingung derNamensnennung. Im Einzelfall kann eine restriktivere Lizenz gelten; dann gelten abweichend von den obigenNutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte.Documents in HENRY are made available under the Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0, if no other license isapplicable. Under CC BY 4.0 commercial use and sharing, remixing, transforming, and building upon the materialof the work is permitted. In some cases a different, more restrictive license may apply; if applicable the terms ofthe restrictive license will be binding.81hydrolink number 3/2019the previous ones; iii) limestones from theMiocene, in the center, working as a freeaquifer layer; their transmissivity is between1,200 and 7,200 m2/day. All these aquifer unitsare separated by aquitards or aquifuges fromthe lower Cretaceous and by detritus rocksfrom the Tertiary (Figure 2).The system is laterally contained by imper-meable borders with the exception of: i) thenortheast border, which is the water divide ofthe Júcar and Guadiana rivers and which doesnot coincide with the groundwater water divide;Sanz [3] suggests that the groundwater divideshould be located 8 to 10 km to the west withThe Eastern Mancha aquifer system (EMAS) isone of the largest carbonate aquifers in thesouthwest of Europe, with a surface of 7260 km2. Located at the Eastern part ofSpain, EMAS belongs to the Júcar river waterbasin (Figure 1).From a geomorphological point of view, thearea is formed by big hollows from the intra-Miocene age, filled with later materials, stillmaintaining its original disposition, resulting ina flat high plain. This high plain, at 700 masl onaverage, is broken only by the Júcar rivervalley, that crosses the system. Surroundingthe plain, the relief is smooth, becoming moreabrupt, together with complex tectonics, awayfrom it (Figure 1).In the EMAS, there are outcrops from theMesozoic, and large Plio-Quaternary deposits.The sedimentary sequence makes a multilayeraquifer with complex interactions between thedifferent aquifer layers. From a hydrogeologicalpoint of view, the EMAS is made up of threehydrogeological units separated by aquitardsor aquifuges [2]. At the base, there is an imper-meable formation of silts, clays and chalksfrom the lower Jurassic. The most importantpermeable facies in the system, for their lateralextension and thickness are: i) dolomites andlimestones from the Jurassic (partly Dogger)throughout the entire system, working as freeaquifer layer towards the outer limits of thesystem and confined elsewhere, with transmis-sivities around 10,000 m2/day; the averagethickness is 250-350 m, with a maximum valueof 400 m; ii) dolomites and limestones from theupper Cretaceous, in the northeastern side,with thicknesses of 50-150 m, as conductive asIAHRGROUNDWATER MANAGEMENT INSPAIN: THE CASE OF THE EASTERNMANCHA AQUIFER SYSTEMBY EDUARDO CASSIRAGA, DAVID SANZ, JUAN JOSÉ GÓMEZ-ALDAY & J. JAIME GÓMEZ-HERNÁNDEZFigure 1. Planview of theEastern Manchaaquifer systemwith a simplifiedgeological map(modified from [1])GROUNDWATER         SPECIALSocio-economic development in the Eastern Mancha during the last 50 years has been made possible thanks tothe intensive use of groundwater for irrigation, mostly financed by the end water users. Unfortunately, this intensivegroundwater exploitation has created problems, such as the continuing lowering of piezometric levels, and thedisconnection of the aquifer from some riverbeds. As a result, groundwater management became an issue witha need to control how and when groundwater could be used. Users, managers and groundwater experts haveimplemented a series of rules with the aim of reverting the effects of the past 50 years.82 hydrolink number 3/2019Figure 3.Differential stream-flows between gagestations at twodifferent stretchesof the Júcar river. Inred observedvalues, in bluesimulated ones.Figure 4. Observed(red) versussimulated (blue)piezometric levelsat a few controlpoints.Figure 2. Geological block diagram of the EMAS. Example of piezometric head evolution in one of the control points.GROUNDWATER         SPECIAL83hydrolink number 3/2019The Júcar Water Authority and the ManchaOriental User Community realized the unsus-tainability of the situation and set a number ofactions to revert the situation, namely: i)harmonization of the water rights and control ofextractions by an annual exploitation planagreed by all stakeholders, ii) improving theefficiency of irrigation systems, iii) importingsurface water from outside of the system toreplace some groundwater extractions, iv)replacing the Albacete city urban groundwatersupply with water from the Alarcón reservoir inthe Júcar river, v) buying (by the water author-ities) some water rights during drought periodsto reduce extractions. All these actions havehad the intended effect as shown by the stabi-lization and initial recovery of the piezometriclevels in the aquifer.The Water Authority and the User Communityestablished a collaboration agreement with theUniversities of Castilla-La Mancha (UCLM) andPolitècnica de València (UPV) to develop anumerical model using MODFLOW [5] and itsgraphical interface ModelMuse [6]. This model,which is calibrated and updated annually,serves to i) study the historical evolution of theaquifer under natural conditions, ii) understandthe water balance of the system, iii) predict thestate of the system, including both streamflows(Figure 3) and piezometric levels (Figure 4), iv)perform long-term scenario analysis and v)simulate the impact that actions such as wellreplacement or the buying of water rights mayhave during drought periods.Model results have allowed a better under-standing of the functioning of the EMAS and itsinteractions with the Júcar river, as well as tomake predictions of how the different actionsconsidered by the stakeholders will affect thesystem. The Eastern Mancha Aquifer System is a clearexample in which the awareness by stake-holders of a situation of unsustainability givesrise to collaboration among all concernedparties resulting in the acceptance of a set ofnecessary actions to prevent the continuousdeterioration, and ultimately lead to the reversalof the depletion of the system. nReferences[1] Sanz D., Vos J., Rambags F., Hoogesteger J., Cassiraga E. andGómez-Alday J. J. (2018). The social construction and conse-quences of groundwater modelling: insight from the ManchaOriental aquifer, Spain, International Journal of Water ResourcesDevelopment, DOI: 10.1080/07900627.2018.1495619.[2] Sanz D., Gómez-Alday J. J., Castaño S., Moratalla Á., De las HerasJ. and Martínez-Alfaro P. E. (2009). Hydrostratigraphic frameworkand hydrogeological behaviour of the Mancha Oriental System (SESpain), Hydrogeology Journal, DOI 10.1007/s10040-009-0446-y.[3] Sanz D. (2005). Contribution to the geometrical characterisation ofrespect to the surface water divide, andpossibly be variable in time; and ii) thesouthwest border, which is in contact with theaquifers of Jardín-Lezuza and Arco de Alcarazthat provide water to the EMAS. From a waterbalance point of view, under natural conditions,the main water input would be rain infiltrationplus lateral inflow from the southwest aquifers,and the main water output would be the Júcarriver.In the middle of the 1960’s, from initial hydro-geological studies, the significance of theEMAS as a water reservoir was recognized,with an estimate of exploitable resources of350 x 106 m3/year. This understanding,together with the discovery of submersiblewater pumps, cheap energy, and the relativelyhigh price of crops, such as corn, produced asurge of well drilling by individuals, withoutmuch control by the water authorities, and thetransformation of large areas into irrigatedland. In the following years, a new legislationabout water rights plus the lack of enoughpersonnel to supervise the application of thenew law, made the characterization, regulationand control of new wells difficult. The ManchaOriental region suffered an important economictransformation driven by the development of100,000 new hectares, most of them ground-water irrigated. In the first decade of the 21stcentury, groundwater extraction from EMASwas as large as 400 x 106 m3/year, 98% ofwhich went to irrigation. Extractions were notcompatible with the estimated sustainablevolume by [4] of 320 x 106 m3/year, which,together with drought periods between 1990and 1994, induced a significant drawdown inthe piezometric level (as high as 80 m in someareas) and a reduction in the water flow fromaquifer to the Júcar river (Figure 2).The hydrogeological regime of the system hasclearly been modified. Groundwater is nowflowing to the cones of depression created bythe extraction wells and the river-aquifer inter-action has changed. The Júcar river changedfrom being a draining stream to a rechargingone; the drawdown produced by the extractionwells prompted a recharge from the river tocompensate for the large extractions. But thetotal rate of extraction was so large that in the1990’s the Júcar river, for the first time onrecord, went dry during the drought of 1990-1994. The point where the water table droppedbelow the river bed moved 20 km downstreamwith respect to its position prior to thebeginning of the extensive pumping.IAHREduardo Cassiraga is anassociate professor ofHydrogeology at the UniversitatPolitècnica de València (UPV)in Spain. He received aHydraulic Engineering degreefrom the Universidad Nacionalde La Plata, Argentina (1989),and a Ph.D. on Geostatistics from UPV (1999). Hehas been in the university since 1992, first as a PhDstudent and then as a professor. His lines of researchare applied geostatistics, modeling of groundwaterflow, modeling of precipitation with meteorologicalradar.David Sanz has a Ph.D. inGeological Sciences byComplutense University ofMadrid (Spain). He is an expertin Groundwater Modelling,Remote Sensing and GIStechniques. At present, he isassistant professor inUniversity of Castilla-La Mancha. Current areas ofresearch include the modeling of water resources(surface and groundwater) for agriculture.J. J. Gómez-Alday has a Ph.D. in Geology from BasqueCountry University (Spain) anda master degree inManagement in InternationalTrade. He is an associateprofessor and director ofHydrogeology Group(University of Castilla-La Mancha). Research areainclude: transport, fate and natural attenuation ofcontaminants in natural systems.J. Jaime Gómez-Hernández isa full professor ofHydrogeology at the UniversitatPolitècnica de València (UPV)in Spain. He received a CivilEngineering degree by UPV(1983), and an M.Sc. inApplied Hydrogeology (1987)and a Ph.D. on Geostatistics (1990) both by StanfordUniversity. He joined UPV in 1994, where he hasdeveloped his research career in the fields of appliedgeostatistics, inverse modeling, stochasticgroundwater modeling, and nuclear waste disposal.He has authored more than 100 publications in peer-reviewed journals.GROUNDWATER         SPECIALthe hydrogeological units forming the Mancha Oriental aquifersystem. PhD Thesis, Univ. Complutense de Madrid, Spain.[4] Estrela T., Fidalgo A., Fullana J., Maestu J., Pérez M. A., Pujante A.M. (2004). Júcar Pilot River Basin. Provisional Article 5 Reportpursuant to the Water Framework Directive. Ministry for theEnvironment, Valencia, Spain.[5] McDonald, M. y Harbaugh, A. (1984). A Modular Three-Dimensional Finite-Difference Ground-Water Flow Model. U.S.Geological Survey, Open File Report 83-875.[6] Winston, R. B. (2009). ModelMuse-A graphical user interface forMODFLOW-2005 and PHAST. Chapter 29 of Section A, GroundWater Book 6, Modeling Techniques, U.S. Geological Survey.

Groundwater management in Spain - The Case of the eastern Mancha Aquifer System

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Groundwater management in Spain - The Case of the eastern Mancha Aquifer System

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