The main goal of this STSM is to assess potential environmental and hydrological impacts of offshore groundwater extraction. The main hydrological concern is that pumping offshore fresh groundwater could lead to decrease in groundwater heads in the landward portion of the aquifer systems. This could harm the onshore ecosystem and hinder access to freshwater for coastal communities. Furthermore, extracting offshore fresh groundwater could disrupt the natural hydrogeological system and groundwater flow regimes offshore. This could directly threaten marine ecosystem dependent on brackish water conditions that are a result of fresh groundwater springs at the seafloor. The goal of this STSM is to build a set of regional scale 3D groundwater flow models with semi-conceptual geological scenarios. This will help us understand what regional characteristics and conditions are most (and least) prone to negative effects of offshore fresh groundwater extraction.
