The project
It is expected that in the next decades Europe will suffer a dramatic reduction of availability and easy access to water resources. Artificial recharge is an appropriate and effective tool to protect both surface and groundwater. The need for artificial recharge is underlined in SFWSD documents, in the national and international literature and in national and European research and technological development projects funded by EU programmes. Artificial recharge techniques have already been applied to coastal salty aquifers to decrease salt intrusion, but recharge is not regulated at EU level; Italian water directives too limit its application to salty aquifers. Despite that pilot projects on AR are currently defined and waiting for a final regulation of the issue. To guarantee a correct application of recharge techniques, relevant decrees and directives should define: site and methodologies to find surface water resources; chemical and physical characteristics of recharge water with respect to the chemical interactions and structure of the aquifer; recharge methods; environmental impact; set-up and implementation of monitoring network. If not regulated, the large-scale use of artificial recharge would entail risks for both the quality (i.e., pollution, accidental mixing of freshwater coming from different water bodies, etc.) and quantity of freshwater (changes in porosity due to the precipitation of salts and/or to the deposition of clay particles, changes in the dynamic behaviour of the aquifer, etc.). Project will take advantages by the results obtained during the previous CAMI LIFE and e Trust LIFE Projects. They will represent the fundaments for setting up strategies for efficient actions aimed to contrast the present trend of decrease of level and drying up of wetlands which has been is affecting wetlands and spring on both sides of Tagliamento river since the last two decades.
Tests will be implemented on sites with artificial recharge problems hosting endangered ecosystems of interest where urgent measures are needed to combat water scarcity involving regional authorities, public and private stakeholders operating in the field of water management to guarantee the future application of the method and the achievement of objective. Experimental protocols to define the administrative procedure and procedures to manage recharge activities will be developed and will consider : Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and Minimum Vital Flow (MVF). Protocols concerning direct and indirect investigations will be finalized and applied in two main macro-areas: a) The Friuli plain, to identify the short- and long-term effects of recharge of highly permeable aquifers to mitigate the lowering of piezometric levels and the degradation of the forested areas impacted by a gradual shift of the springs towards lower altitudes and to estimate the water savings that could be achieved through the reclamation and use of grey water in SARC test site. b) The southern plain in the Copparo area (Ferrara) to evaluate issues connected with recharge activities in salinized aquifer inland characterised by medium-low permeability and to estimate the effectiveness of phyto-purification systems and the improvement of biodiversity.