Evaluation of Groundwater Renewability in the Henan Plains, China

The sustainability of groundwater resources in the Henan Plains, located in the eastern portion of central China, has been threatened by both increasing industrial and agricultural pumping and periods of drought occurring since the 1990s. Therefore, there is an urgent need to improve water resources management in the Henan Plains. However, the recharge and annual renewal rate are very difficult to calculate when based only on traditional hydrogeological methods because of inadequate hydrometeorologic data. In this study, tritium concentrations in groundwater and reconstructed 3H concentration time series from 1953~2009 in precipitation were used to determine the annual groundwater renewal rate. The 3H concentrations mostly range from 2.91 to 40.30 TU in the shallow groundwater with a mean 3H concentration of 19.13TU, which suggests that the shallow groundwater is recharged from modern precipitation after 1953 in the study area. Three exceptionally low 3H concentration(less than 1TU) wells were sampled in Xinxiang, Puyang and Zhengyang which indicates that those wells contain deep old groundwater recharge before 1953 as a result of over-pumping. High renewal rates (more than 4%/a) of groundwater are located mainly in the recharge area such as along the Yellow River and in the pediments of Taihang Mountain, Songqi Mountain, Funiu Mountain, Dabie Mountain, where the groundwater extraction volume could be increased. Moderate renewal rates (2%/a~3%/a) of groundwater are mainly in the runoff area where the groundwater extraction volume can be kept at current levels. Low renewal rates (1%/a~2%/a) of groundwater are located mainly in the discharge areas in the eastern regions of Nanle, Puyang, Shangqiu, Luyi where the groundwater extraction volume should be reduced. The lowest renewal rates of (less than 1%/a) groundwater are in Puyang, Xinxiang, Zhengyang and Xixian, where the groundwater extraction volume should be restricted.