Multi-hazard Groundwater Risks to Water Supply from Shallow Depths: Challenges to Achieving the Sustainable Development
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Multi‑hazard Groundwater Risks to Water Supply from Shallow Depths: Challenges to Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in Bangladesh Mohammad Shamsudduha1 · George Joseph2 · Sabrina S. Haque2,3 · Mahfuzur R. Khan4 · Anwar Zahid5 · Kazi Matin U. Ahmed4 Received: 19 September 2019 / Revised: 19 September 2019 / Accepted: 26 September 2019 © The Author(s) 2019
Abstract Groundwater currently provides 98% of all drinking-water supply in Bangladesh. Groundwater is found throughout Bangladesh but its quality (i.e., arsenic and salinity contamination) and quantity (i.e., water-storage depletion) vary across hydrological environments, posing unique challenges to certain geographical areas and population groups. Yet, no national-scale, multi-parameter groundwater hazard maps currently exist enabling water resources managers and policy makers to identify vulnerable areas to public health. We develop, for the first time, groundwater multi-hazard maps at the national scale of Bangladesh combining information on arsenic, salinity, and water storage. We apply geospatial techniques in ‘R’ programming language and ArcGIS environment, linking hydrological indicators for water quality and quantity to construct risk maps. A range of socioeconomic variables including access to drinking and irrigation water supplies and social vulnerability (i.e., poverty) are overlaid on these risk maps to estimate exposures. Our multi-parameter groundwater hazard maps show that a considerable proportion of land area (5–24% under extremely high to high risks) in Bangladesh is currently under combined risk of arsenic and salinity contamination, and groundwater-storage depletion. As small as 6.5 million (2.2 million poor) to 24.4 million (8.6 million poor) people are exposed to a combined risk of high arsenic, salinity, and groundwater-storage depletion. Our groundwater hazard maps reveal areas and exposure of population groups to water risks posed by arsenic and salinity contamination and depletion of water storage. These geospatial hazard maps can potentially guide policy makers in prioritizing mitigation and adaptation measures in order to achieve the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals across the water, agriculture, and public health sectors in Bangladesh. Keywords Groundwater · Water supply · Risks to public health · Global change · Bangladesh
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s12403-019-00325-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Mohammad Shamsudduha [email protected] 1
Department of Geography, University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton BN1 9SJ, UK
2
Water Global Practice, World Bank, Washington, DC 20433, USA
3
Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA
4
Department of Geology, University of Dhaka, Dhaka 1000, Bangladesh
5
Bangladesh Water Development Board, Green Road, Dhaka 1205, Bangladesh
Introduction Groundwater is the largest store of freshwater th
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