DEVELOPING A THREAT AND VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT AND MONITORING FRAMEWORK FOR URBAN KARST GROUNDWATER MANAGEMENT

Every continent in the world has karst landscape features, with nearly a quarter of the human population living on, or near, karst regions and using karst groundwater aquifers as drinking water sources. Rapid population growth globally is becoming an issue, but the impacts on urban karst landscapes and their groundwater resources are understudied. Contaminants in urban karst aquifers are relatively understudied and there is also little to no research conducted on new threats to groundwater quality, such as antibiotic resistant genes (ARGs), pharmaceuticals, and emerging pathogens (superbugs). The purpose of this study is to develop a holistic, data-driven threat and vulnerability assessment and monitoring framework for urban karst groundwater systems, using the City of Bowling Green, Kentucky and the Tampa Bay Metropolitan Area in west-central Florida as a case studies, in order to better determine the possible threats, data collection solutions, and management approaches to ensure groundwater quality is maintained for all uses. Preliminary results indicate that a scoring approach works well to identify appropriate sites for monitoring and that ARGs and related emerging pathogens, along with high concentrations of urban pollutants, are likely ubiquitous in karst groundwater systems and appropriate monitoring solutions are needed to mitigate these threats.