Submarine groundwater discharge

Abstract

Governmental agencies and private organizations need SGD information to better address water degradation issues and to create numerical models. Accurate determination of SGD is essential in calculating mass balances and in the determination of nutrient fluxes to the coastal waters. Experience has shown that quantifying this input is difficult because of uncertainties in the direct measurement of groundwater flux and in the simulation of groundwater fluxes. Accurate knowledge of SGD is important because it can be an unseen hazard and can be used to assess environmental problems in coastal environments. The contribution of SGD to the coastal hydrologic regime is occasionally recognized in association with crescendo events and concurrent marine algal blooms that degrade water quality, bottom habitats, and coral reef ecology (Finkl and Krupa, 2003). However, the more common situation is that SGD laden with nutrients from agrourban activities on adjacent coastal plains causes environmental degradation so gradually that the cause and effect can escape public attention.