Post a comment on the text below

Bar-charts are used to visualize the distribution of the groundwater level trend at the EU level and regional level. In this bar-chart, the percentages of monitoring stations that fall within the three GLT classes are shown (orange-grey-blue colour scheme), as well as the number of monitoring locations for Europe and for each region.

At country level, the groundwater level trends are visualized at 3 aggregation levels:
• Level 1: map of Europe with for each country a pie-chart that show the percentages of monitoring stations that fall within the three GLT classes as well as the number of monitoring locations for that country.
• Level 1, alternative: bar-chart with that shows for each country the percentages of monitoring stations that fall within the three GLT classes as well as the number of monitoring locations for that country.
• Level 2: map of Europe with individual monitoring locations indicating the GLT using a yellow-grey-blue colour scheme.
• Level 3: graphs for each monitoring locations, showing the individual groundwater level data points (m + sea level) over time and, in case of a significant trend, the groundwater level trend line and slope (m/y).
(The second and third level are made available via a link to the data and maps section of the website.)

Note: For monitoring stations with the confidentiality remark, locations, groundwater level data, and groundwater level trends will not be shown in maps. However, these monitoring locations are used at aggregated level assessments and visualisations.

Previous comments

  • scheidand (Andreas Scheidleder) 22 Oct 2021 13:58:48

    Comment from AT

    1st sentence: be careful when using “EU”. EU (European Union) and Europe are not the same.
    3rd sentence: bar-chart with…(what?)...that
    0.01 m/y is probably the measurement uncertainty. What about defining a “critical trend” in relation to a time span? In my eye 0.01 m/y is not of interest. Furthermore, the significance of a trend also depends on the hydrogeological properties of a GWB.

    In 2.10 you compare the GLT with the Standardized Groundwater trend indicator. Please also describe in this chapter which other methods you have considered and would have been appropriate for trend assessments and explain why you have chosen the GLT.

    • zalllnih (Nihat Zal) 26 Nov 2021 15:55:04

      Thank you for your comment.

      The term “EU” is replaced by “Europe”.

      The section with the describtion of the figures was adjusted to the new figures 1a and 1b. Also, the bar-chart is described in more detail:

      “The groundwater level trends are visualized at 3 aggregation levels:

      Level 1: A pie-chart and a bar-chart with the three main GLT classes are made to visualize the distribution of the groundwater level trends for the European countries where data is available for the indicator assessment. In these charts, the percentages of monitoring stations that fall within the three GLT classes are shown (orange-grey-blue colour scheme), as well as the number of monitoring locations for each region country.  UN M49 standard is used for grouping the countries in four regions.

      Level 2: map of Europe with individual monitoring locations indicating the three main GLT classes using a yellow-grey-blue colour scheme.

      Level 3: graphs for each monitoring locations, showing the individual groundwater level data points (m + sea level) over time and, in case of a significant trend, the groundwater level trend line and slope (m/y).”

       For the development of the EEA groundwater level trend indicator, an overview of existing groundwater quantity indicators and literature reporting on multi-year groundwater level trend analysis was made, including a description of their main characteristics, data requirements and examples of application. None of these existing groundwater approaches was fully suited, either because the scope of the indicator was not focussing on multi-year groundwater level trend analysis (eg. Groundwater Footprint Index, Standardized Groundwater Index) and/or because the data requirements of the indicator was sufficient in the WISE SoE. The latter was the case for all existing indicators and examples from literature. As a result, no conclusive guidelines were available from literature either to develop the EEA groundwater level trend indicator based on scientific approach. The methodology described and applied for this indicator sheet was developed with the intention to make best use of the capacity of the available groundwater level dataset to provide a European overview.

       This information, including an overview of the consulted literature, is added to the methodology section in “supporting information”.

      Comment from AT

      1st sentence: be careful when using “EU”. EU (European Union) and Europe are not the same.
      3rd sentence: bar-chart with…(what?)...that
      0.01 m/y is probably the measurement uncertainty. What about defining a “critical trend” in relation to a time span? In my eye 0.01 m/y is not of interest. Furthermore, the significance of a trend also depends on the hydrogeological properties of a GWB.

      In 2.10 you compare the GLT with the Standardized Groundwater trend indicator. Please also describe in this chapter which other methods you have considered and would have been appropriate for trend assessments and explain why you have chosen the GLT.

       

You cannot post comments to this consultation because you are not authenticated. Please log in.