Sun Siao, Liu Hui, Konar Megan, Fu Guangtao, Fang Chuanglin, Huang Zhongwei, Li Guagndong, Qi Wei, Tang Qiuhong
Key Laboratory of Regional Sustainable Development Modeling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.
College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2025 Feb 25;122(8):e2412338122. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2412338122. Epub 2025 Feb 20.
Groundwater is essential to urban water supplies throughout the world, but we do not understand how quantity and quality issues may jeopardize the ability of cities to meet their water needs. Here, we present a national analysis of both quantity and quality challenges facing China's urban groundwater supply security, using high-resolution groundwater depletion modeling and a recently compiled dataset detailing quality violations in drinking groundwater sources. We estimate that 180 cities (about half of the prefecture-level-and-above cities), accounting for 311 million urban residents, face at least one groundwater pressure between 2016 and 2021. Cities that face dual quantity and quality pressures pinpoints hotspots of intense groundwater threats- Specifically, 40 cities, mainly situated in Northeast China and the middle to lower reaches of the Yellow River, are exposed to dual groundwater pressures. The results highlight the interconnected and possibly mutually reinforcing nature of groundwater depletion and quality issues. The logistic regression models indicate that groundwater depletion and quality violations are associated with natural water endowment and anthropogenic factors. Particularly, drinking groundwater quality issues are clustered in relation to socioeconomic gaps, with larger, wealthier cities being less prone to such problems. We argue that securing drinking water sources in small and poor cities through integrated groundwater management and economic assistance should be an important national priority for achieving groundwater supply sustainability.
地下水对全球城市供水至关重要，但我们并不清楚水量和水质问题会如何危及城市满足其用水需求的能力。在此，我们利用高分辨率地下水消耗模型以及最近汇编的详细列出饮用水源水质违规情况的数据集，对中国城市地下水供应安全面临的水量和水质挑战进行了全国性分析。我们估计，在2016年至2021年期间，有180个城市（约占地级市及以上城市的一半）面临至少一种地下水压力，涉及3.11亿城市居民。面临水量和水质双重压力的城市确定了地下水高强度威胁的热点地区——具体而言，40个城市，主要位于中国东北和黄河中下游地区，面临双重地下水压力。结果凸显了地下水消耗和水质问题相互关联且可能相互强化的性质。逻辑回归模型表明，地下水消耗和水质违规与自然水资源禀赋及人为因素有关。特别是，饮用水水质问题与社会经济差距相关联，规模较大、较富裕的城市较少出现此类问题。我们认为，通过综合地下水管理和经济援助确保中小城市和贫困城市的饮用水源安全，应成为实现地下水供应可持续性的一项重要国家优先事项。
