UNTANGLING THE IMPLICATIONS OF WATER MANAGEMENT ON HYDROLOGIC SYSTEMS (Invited Presentation)

Understanding the interactions and feedbacks between anthropogenic activities and the hydrologic cycle is critical to water security and environmental sustainability. The hydrologic responses to concurrent anthropogenic activities, such as land use change, water management, and natural resource extraction, are particularly important as the synergistic effects can magnify or mitigate critical issues, such as water availability and contaminant release and transport. This work focuses on identifying and quantifying how water management strategies, particularly reservoir management, surface diversions, and groundwater extraction can have cascading effects throughout the hydrologic system. Using theoretical development (e.g. extrapolation from geochemistry), observational data analyses (e.g., trend and correlation analyses), and analytical and numerical models (e.g. solutions for stream depletion and integrated hydrologic models) we demonstrate how water management strategies can alter groundwater surface water interactions and sediment and solute transport through the terrestrial hydrologic cycle at a variety of scales. This work emphasizes the need for holistic water management approaches that consider the implications of decisions on the greater hydrologic system.