'NERC-NSTC': Groundwater Resources in a Changing Climate (GRCC) - A Taiwan & UK partnership to share and develop groundwater knowledge and expertise

地下水提供了全球约三分之一的淡水供应，据估计，约有25亿人完全依赖地下水来满足基本的日常用水需求。它对农业灌溉、工业供水至关重要，并维持着重要的依赖地下水的陆地生态系统。然而，这种对地下水的高度依赖意味着全球各地的社区和生态系统很容易受到地下水资源自然变化和气候变化的影响。因此，地下水干旱、地下水水位低于正常水平的时期以及与之相关的地表水干旱是对全球水安全的主要威胁，并可能受到气候变化的影响。研究表明，随着气候变暖，英国地下水干旱变得越来越频繁、持续时间越来越长、越来越严重，而且，无论气候环境如何，国家和社区都越来越意识到气候变化对水资源恢复能力的影响。例如，台湾和英国最近都遭受了严重干旱。2021年，台湾经历了50多年来最严重的干旱，原因是一年一度的台风季节未能到来，导致公共、工业和农业供水受到限制。作为回应，台湾水利部新建了190口地下水井。在英国，从2010年到2012年，是100多年来最干旱的18个月，导致地下水位创历史新低，2012年春季，约2000万人被禁止使用“水管”，环境和农业部门受到严重不利影响。在这两种情况下，干旱都是由与气候变化影响一致的异常降雨不足造成的，要么是台湾年度台风的失败，要么是英国连续的冬季干旱。因此，迫切需要更好地了解地下水干旱的形成和传播，并改进气候变化下地下水和相关地表水资源与干旱的短期和长期预报和预测。应“科技部”、“科技部”、“英国自然环境研究委员会”的号召，提出了“Channing气候下地下水研究（GRCC）伙伴关系”。​建立伙伴关系的活动和在三个技术方面的联合工作将促进这项工作。为了确保它的持续，GRCC伙伴关系将明确为早期职业研究人员（ecr）提供支持，以成长为领导角色，并将从GRCC的所有活动中学习，以制定一个计划，为GRCC资助的初始阶段之后的未来合作和伙伴关系的发展提供支持。GRCC伙伴关系活动包括：常规项目团队风险投资；每年互访举办联合研讨会，并就三个研究主题开展合作；以及，允许访问和参与区域（台湾和英国）研究论坛，以扩大GRCC伙伴关系的影响范围。GRCC伙伴关系将在三个研究领域开展工作并产生联合成果：地下水干旱；基流干旱；地下水干旱预测与预报。GRCC将提高我们在这一重要课题上进行有影响力的研究的能力，显著提高我们目前的能力和未来的潜力，提供世界领先的创新研究，有助于改善台湾、英国和更广泛的水资源和干旱管理规划。

Groundwater provides about of one-third of global freshwater supplies and it has been estimated that about 2.5 billion people are solely dependent on groundwater for basic daily water needs. It is critical for agricultural irrigation, industrial water supplies, and it sustains important groundwater-dependent terrestrial ecosystems. However, this high level of dependence on groundwater means that communities and ecosystems across the globe are vulnerable to natural changes in groundwater resources and the impacts of climate change. Consequently, groundwater droughts, periods of below-normal groundwater levels, and associated surface water droughts are a major threat to global water security and are potentially susceptible to being modified by climate change.It has been shown that groundwater droughts are becoming more frequent, longer and more intense in the UK consistent with climate warming, and, that regardless of climate setting, nations and communities are increasingly aware of the impacts of climate change on the resilience of water resources. For example, Taiwan and the UK have both suffered recent major droughts. In 2021 Taiwan experienced its worst drought in over 50 years due to failure of the annual typhoon season leading to restrictions in public, industrial and agriculture water supplies. In response, the Taiwan Ministry of Water commissioned 190 new groundwater wells. In the UK, the driest 18 months for over 100 years, from 2010 to 2012, led to record low groundwater levels, 'hosepipe bans' were imposed on ~20 million people in spring 2012, and the environment and farming sectors were significantly adversely affected. In both cases the episodes of drought were driven by exceptional rainfall deficits consistent with the effects of climate change, either by the failure of the annual typhoons in Taiwan, or successive dry winters in the UK. As a result, there is a pressing need to better understand the formation and propagation of groundwater droughts and for improved short- and long-term forecasting and prediction of groundwater and linked surface water resources and droughts under climate change.In response to the call from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (MOST) and Natural Environment Research Council, UK, the Groundwater Research in a Channing Climate (GRCC) Partnership is proposed. The GRCC is a new multi-disciplinary research partnership between the National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), Taiwan and the British Geological Survey (BGS) UK that will enable the sharing of knowledge and expertise and will build an enduring research capacity to addresses research challenges and societal needs related to groundwater droughts common to Taiwan and the UK. It will be facilitated by partnership-building activities and by joint working on three technical strands. To ensure that it endures, the GRCC Partnership will explicitly provide support for early careers researchers (ECRs) to grow into leadership roles and it will consolidate learning from all GRCC activities to produce a plan for future collaboration and growth of the partnership following the initial phase of GRCC funding. The GRCC Partnership activities include: regular project team VCs; reciprocal, annual visits for joint workshops and to enable joint working on the three research themes; and, to enable access to and participation in regional (Taiwan and UK) research fora to widen the reach of the GRCC Partnership. The GRCC Partnership will work on and produce joint deliverables on three research strands: groundwater droughts; baseflow (streamflow) droughts; and, groundwater drought prediction and forecasting. The GRCC will enhance our ability to deliver impactful research on this important topic by significantly growing our current capability and future potential to provide world-leading, innovative research that can contribute to improved water resource and drought management planning in Taiwan, the UK, and more widely.