Assessment, Monitoring, and Modeling of LCLUC and Their Impacts on Groundwater Resources, Ecosystems, and Carbon Cycling in Saharan Africa:  A Case Study, SW Egypt

We are developing and applying an integrated systems approach that involves the analysis of temporal remote sensing data, geochemical and ecological analyses, and hydrologic modeling to assess, monitor, and model the recent and future impacts of changes in the landscape and land cover associated with major agricultural development projects in Saharan Africa. These development projects are affecting the water resources of the underlying groundwater aquifers and the existing fresh water ecosystems, as well as producing new carbon sinks. Southwest Egypt was chosen as a test site, because Egypt’s landscape and its climatic and hydrologic settings resemble those in neighboring Saharan countries, where aggressive land use development projects are also under way. We are monitoring and modeling the hydrologic impacts of the development of Lake Nasser behind the Aswan High Dam that raised groundwater tables of the Nubian aquifer in the vicinity of the lake by over 40 m. Similarly, we are investigating the hydrologic impacts caused by the creation of four adjoining lakes to the west of Lake Nasser as lake levels peaked (1990 to present) and overflowed the Tushka spillway. We are also monitoring the agricultural expansion and quantifying the amounts of carbon being sequestered in surface and subsurface sources in these new agricultural communities as they develop.