Vulnerability to Groundwater Arsenic in the Bengal Basin: The Interplay between Dense Populations, Geologic Complexity, and Large-Scale Geogenic Contamination
Abstract
Widespread contamination of shallow groundwater with arsenic concentrations above World Health Organization standards occurs throughout much of the lower Bengal Basin, in Bangladesh and West Bengal, India, threatening the health of tens of millions of people. High concentrations are limited to the upper 100m in many areas; thus deep groundwater has been targeted as a mitigation option. The sustainability of deep resources depends on hydraulics and chemistry since both flowpaths and reaction may reduce vulnerability. We evaluate the sustainability of deep, low-arsenic groundwater as a mitigation option with numerical models that incorporate geologic, hydrologic, and human (pumping) aspects of the complex fluvio-deltaic aquifer system. Results suggest that sustainability may be achieved in some areas by limiting deep pumping to domestic supply, but also highlight the risks and uncertainty introduced by the interplay between geologic complexity and groundwater extraction on a large scale.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AGUFMGH42A..01M
- Keywords:
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- 0230 Impacts of climate change: human health;
- GEOHEALTH;
- 0232 Impacts of climate change: ecosystem health;
- GEOHEALTH;
- 0240 Public health;
- GEOHEALTH;
- 1615 Biogeochemical cycles;
- processes;
- and modeling;
- GLOBAL CHANGE