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Addressing Groundwater Challenges: Saltwater Intrusion and Water Waste Solutions

Groundwater depletion presents severe challenges, including saltwater intrusion, where the freshwater-saltwater interface shifts inland, and subsidence, leading to sinkholes. Inefficient irrigation systems waste up to 60% of water through evaporation and runoff. Conventional methods, like flood and spray irrigation, lose significant water, urging the adoption of advanced technologies such as drip irrigation, xeriscaping, and gray water systems to minimize waste. Additionally, the rising problem of water pollution, notably from agricultural runoff and sewage, underscores the need for sustainable practices and potential solutions like desalinization, despite its costs.

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Addressing Groundwater Challenges: Saltwater Intrusion and Water Waste Solutions

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  1. Tapping groundwater – problems • Saltwater Intrusion • Normal interface between freshwater and saltwater moves inland • Figure 15-17

  2. Subsidence: • Land sinks

  3. Sinkholes • Roof of cavern collapses

  4. Reducing Water Waste

  5. Why do we really waste so much? • Underpricing! We don’t really pay for it!!!!

  6. Conventional Irrigation • “About 60% of the irrigation water applied throughout the world does not reach targeted crops.” • Most lost to evaporation and run-off

  7. Examples: • Flood irrigation:

  8. Conventional spray irrigation:

  9. More efficient irrigation technologies include:

  10. Center Pivot

  11. LEPA: Low Energy Precision Application

  12. Drip Irrigation, Microirrigation

  13. Other ways to reduce water waste:

  14. Xeriscaping • Replace green lawns with vegetation adapted to the climate! (natural)

  15. Gray Water System

  16. Using storm run-off

  17. This storm water system will reduce the building’s water bill by 90% and save water resources

  18. In the U.S.: Flushing toilets with water clean enough to drink is the single largest use of domestic water.

  19. Solution: Desalinization?? • Reverse osmosis or Distillation • Disadvantages: • Expensive • Energy Intensive • Produces Briny Water

  20. Water Pollution

  21. Major Categories: Table 22-1

  22. Point Source: discharge pollutants at specific locations

  23. Non-Point Source: scattered and diffuse; can not be traced to any single point.

  24. The leading Non-Point Source of water pollution:

  25. Eutrophication: Natural nutrient enrichment

  26. Cultural Eutrophication: excessive inputs of nutrients due to human activities. • What are NUTRIENTS????

  27. Produce “blooms” of algae, cyanobacteria, or aquatic plants • Initially, produce Oxygen; however, massive die-offsand decomposition via bacteria sucks OUT all Oxygen • Ecosystem suffocates!!

  28. Animal wastes • Fertilizer run-off (agricultural and domestic) • Sewage • 80-90% of raw sewage in developing countries dumped directly into lakes/streams • Approx. 85% of raw sewage from people around Mediterranean Sea dumped along the coast

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