A group of researchers from CERENA – professors Leonardo Azevedo, Maria João Pereira, Amílcar Soares and Manuel Ribeiro – joined an european consortium that will work on groundwater management. The european project “InTheMed- Innovative and Sustainable Groundwater Management in the Mediterranean” aims to develop a web platform that allows aquifer users to know the impact of their actions on underground resources.
The participation of Técnico professors in the consortium is “due to their experience in spatial statistics techniques applied to the modeling of different natural and anthropogenic phenomena, such as, for example, natural resource modeling, soil contamination and environmental epidemiology”, as stressed by professor Leonardo Azevedo, who leads the CERENA team in this project. “The Principal Investigator of the project, professor Jaime Gomez-Hernandez, needed a partner to perform tasks related to data integration mehods in this type of models and chose our team”, adds the Técnico professor.
The ultimate goal of InTheMED project will be to develop an easy-to-use decision support tool available to communities on a web platform. This tool will allow users – whether they are farmers, water resources management authorities, municipalities, or industries – “to predict the evolution of the system and the impact of their actions on underground resources”.
A tool “as comprehensive as possible” is the purpose of the research team, not only alerting to waste, but also to make the users understand the impact of their actions on the quantity and quality of water available in groundwater reserves. “The user will face a series of possible scenarios based on the use of this resource”, says the researcher.
CERENA’s role in this consortium will be decisive, contributing essentially in two major areas: “the application of spatial data science techniques to analyse the aquifers production history and to identify global and regional trends; and the development of innovative modeling techniques through indirect measurements – geophysical data – and direct measurements – geophysical inversion”, explains professor Leonardo Azevedo. “We are also responsible for project communication”, he adds.
The project will be developed in 5 European universities and two North African universities, and will focus on specific issues of the Mediterranean region. Five pilot study cases will be prepared in Portugal, Spain, Greece, Tunisia and Turkey. “in order to demonstrate the different realities”, stresses the Técnico professor. In Portugal we will study the Castro Verde aquifer in association with SOMINCOR
InTheMED obtained a €1.5 million fund from PRIMA- Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean. The project officially started on 28th April 2020 and will run until 2023. During this period, several actions are planned with the communities in order to include their needs into the tool to be developed and to explore better solutions to groundwater management.
“Besides the technological aspects, InTheMED plays a very important role in terms of communication and contact with the community”, reiterates professor Leonardo Azevedo. “We hope not only to raise awareness among the population about the need for a balanced management of this resource, but also to provide tools that allow them to use this resource in a conscious and sustainable way”, he concludes.
