Groundwater and Drought Resilience in the SGMA Era

Abstract

Projections are that climate change will increase drought risk and intensity globally. Groundwater is critical during drought, but worldwide aquifers are experiencing unrecoverable groundwater declines. California is ideal to explore strategies for managing groundwater for drought resilience. Many areas rely on groundwater, yet multiple basins are in overdraft. Management was historically centered in local water districts, but in 2014, the state passed the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) establishing mandatory groundwater management rules. This paper discusses strategies used prior to and post SGMA to sustainably manage groundwater for drought resilience, and evaluates the effectiveness of these strategies. It highlights two recent approaches that can increase drought resilience under climate change: flood-MAR – using flood flows for both recharge and irrigation; and the development of locally sited groundwater drought reserves that can serve as a buffer during extreme droughts.

Keywords:

• Drought reserves
• drought resilience
• groundwater
• Sustainable Groundwater Management Act

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Hilary Henry and Amanda Fencl for research assistance and the Society and Natural Resources Editor and Reviewers for their helpful comments.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded in part through two NSF grants to Dr. Langridge.