Local knowledge integration to develop user tailored hydroclimatic service

The increasing intensity and duration of droughts threatens water availability with greater frequency (Ipcc 2022), requiring the adoption of measures in response to these extreme weather events (Berrang-Ford et al. 2021). The lack of hydroclimatic information adapted to users’ needs constrains the adaptive capacity of decision-makers (Lee et al., 2022). To bridge this gap, it is necessary to combine available scientific-technical information with local knowledge through co-production processes that adapt the information to the local context and to the user’s needs (Norström et al. 2020).

In the I-CISK project (https://icisk.eu/), we developed a pre-operational user-centered climate service with hydrogeological information in the Andalucia-Los Pedroches Living Lab, located in northern Cordoba, Spain. The aim of this work is to develop a hydrogeological model of Los Pedroches hard rock aquifer system and its relationship with evolving climate. The availability of hydrological and hydrogeological data in the region is limited, both in terms of the number of measuring points and of the length of available data time-series. The model has been built by integrating scientific and local information using MODFLOW-NWT (USGS, 2022). In this work, local knowledge is understood as personal experience and local ecological knowledge regarding hydrological and hydrogeological information (van den Homberg et al., 2023). First, we conducted an exhaustive review of the information available in the literature, official databases and previous technical studies. Second, we designed a survey to collect local knowledge regarding groundwater functioning and characteristics through semi-structured interviews with users, focus groups and workshops. Third, to complement the limited availability of groundwater level data, we conducted four field campaigns to build a water table database for model validation.

Technical and scientific research enabled the generation of a structured set of data and the identification of knowledge gaps. These gaps were filled based on local knowledge gathered and verified with available hydrogeological information to define the model's physical environment. Local knowledge enabled the adjustment of model boundary conditions, the estimation of the thickness of the aquifer layer, the aquifer-river network connections, and the influence of dikes and fractures on subsurface flow. As in other contexts (Guodaarmarti et al., 2021; Habté et al., 2021), local knowledge integration is key to improving the design of climate change adaptation measures. The integration of these different sources of data and qualitative information into a climate service is expected to provide a more comprehensive characterization of the aquifer and its functioning to improve decision-making processes regarding water resources use.