Diagnosing Land Water Storage Variations in Major Indian River Basins using GRACE observations

Scarcity of freshwater is one of the most critical resource issue the world is facing today. Due to its finite nature, renewable freshwater reserves are under relentless pressure due to population growth, economic development and rapid industrialization. Assessment of Terrestrial Water Storage (TWS), as an unified measure of freshwater reserve, is vital to understand hydrologic and climatic processes controlling its availability. In this study, TWS variations from Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites are analyzed in conjuction with multi-platform hydrologic observations for the period of 2003-2012. Here, the primary objective is to quantify and attribute the observed short-term variability of TWS and groundwater storage in the largest river basins of India (Ganga, Godavari, Krishna and Mahanadi). Alongside commendable agreement between TWS variations obtained from GRACE and water balance computation, results highlight some of the important deficiencies between the two. While monthly changes in TWS are highly correlated with precipitation, monthly TWS anomalies reveal a 1-2 month lag in their concurrence. Analysis of groundwater storage estimates demonstrate significant decline in the Ganga basin (− 1.28 ± 0.20 mm/month) but practically no change in the Mahanadi basin. On the contrary, groundwater storage in Godavari and Krishna basins reveal notable increase at the rate of 0.74 ± 0.21 mm/month and 0.97 ± 0.21 mm/month respectively. Subsequently, in order to assess the influence of quasi-periodic, planetary scale, variations in the Earth's climate system, groundwater storage anomalies are evaluated with reference to ENSO variability. Results manifest that in all the basins, with the exception of Ganga, groundwater storage is dominantly influenced by ENSO, with large decrease (increase) during El Niño (La Niña) events. In the Ganga basin, groundwater storage variations refer to possible amalgamation of human intervention and natural climate variability.