Analysis of the spatio-temporal variability of terrestrial
water storage in the Great Artesian Basin, Australia
Jiabao Yan, Shaofeng Jia, Aifeng Lv, Rashid Mahmood and Wenbin Zhu
ABSTRACT
The Great Artesian Basin (GAB) in Australia, the largest artesian basin in the world, is rich in
groundwater resources. This study analyzed the spatio-temporal characteristics of terrestrial water
storage (TWS) in the GAB for 2003–2014 using satellite (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment,
GRACE) data, hydrological models’ outputs, and in situ data. A slight increase in TWS was observed
for the study period. However, there was a rapid increase in TWS in 2010 and 2011 due to two strong
La Nina events. Long-term mean monthly TWS changes showed remarkable agreements with net
precipitation. Both GRACE derived and in situ groundwater disclosed similar trend patterns.
Groundwater estimated from the PCR-GLOBWB model contributes 26.8% (26.4% from GRACE) to the
total TWS variation in the entire basin and even more than 50% in the northern regions. Surface water
contributes only 3% to the whole basin but more than 60% to Lake Eyre and the Cooper River.
Groundwater, especially deeper than 50 meters, was insensitive to climate factors (i.e., rainfall).
Similarly, the groundwater in the northern Cape York Peninsula was influenced by some other factors
rather than precipitation. The time-lagged correlation analysis between sea surface height and
groundwater storage indicated certain correlations between groundwater and sea level changes.
Jiabao Yan
Shaofeng Jia (corresponding author)
Aifeng Lv
Rashid Mahmood
Wenbin Zhu
Institute of Geographic Science and Natural
Resources Research/Key Laboratory of Water
Cycle and Related Land Surface Processes,
Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Beijing 100101,
China
E-mail: jiasf@igsnrr.ac.cn
Jiabao Yan
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Beijing 100049,
China
Key words | Great Artesian Basin, groundwater, spatio-temporal variability, terrestrial water storage
INTRODUCTION
Groundwater plays a vital role in the indigenous industrial,
domestic, and environmental water uses. In order to utilize
groundwater resources precisely, the spatio-temporal
characteristics of different components of terrestrial water
storage (TWS) should be comprehensively understood. For
a long time, the detection of regional water storage change
has been mainly dependent on in situ observation and mod-
elling approaches. Due to the limited spatial coverage of
observing sites, it is a big challenge for large scale analysis
and evaluation. Although hydrological models can estimate
large scale water storage variations, the lack of observa-
tional data is the main limit to using these models.
Since the launch of the Gravity Recovery and Climate
Experiment (GRACE) satellite in 2002, an unprecedented
satellite-based approach to estimating TWS has been spring-
ing up. The GRACE products have widely been used in
hydrology, including water balance research (Syed et al.
; Swenson & Wahr ), evapotranspiration (ET) esti-
mates (Syed et al. ; Billah et al. ; Wan et al. ),
extreme weather analysis (Long et al. a; Thomas et al.
; Abelen et al. ), and groundwater storage (GWS)
change (Döll et al. ; Famiglietti ; Chen et al. ;
Richey et al. ).
Previous studies mostly focused on the world’s large
basins (Famiglietti ; Getirana et al. ; Long et al.
; Zhang et al. ) and groundwater over-exploitation
areas (Rodell et al. ; Munier et al. ; Feng et al. ;
Huang et al. ). Most of these areas are located in the north-
ern hemisphere. There are a few studies for the whole of
Australia (Brown & Tregoning ; van Dijk et al. ;
Seoane et al. ; Wang et al. ), the Murray–Darling
Basin (Leblanc et al. , ; Brown & Tregoning ;
324 © IWA Publishing 2017 Water Science & Technology: Water Supply | 17.2 | 2017
doi: 10.2166/ws.2016.136
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