Groundwater stress, a critical challenge for global water security and food production, has intensified due to the interaction of global change drivers and rapidly evolving local conditions. This paper investigates the individual and combined impacts of water availability, heat, population growth, income dynamics, and technological advancements on global groundwater stress over a historical period from 1997 to 2017. Utilizing the gridded Simplified International Model of agricultural Prices, Land use, and the Environment (SIMPLE-G), the study attributes local changes in water and land use patterns to these key global drivers. Furthermore, it evaluates an alternative, counterfactual scenario in which sustainable management interventions for groundwater resources are implemented over these two historical decades. The analysis quantifies the historical contribution of each global change driver to local groundwater stress and measures the economic benefits of a scenario in which groundwater extraction caps and improved technology adoption began in 1997. We find that implementing a groundwater extraction cap combined with irrigation investment beginning in 1997 could have reduced global groundwater withdrawals by more than 34% by 2017, preserving over 5 trillion cubic meters of groundwater in aquifers, with the greatest reductions occurring in South Asia and the Western United States. This study contributes to the local-global analysis of the effects of global socio-economic drivers on earth systems through high-resolution, scenario-based modeling.
Observations from the Little Bunker
Last updated: August 19, 2025 10:09 PM
Atmospheric CO₂
425.4 ppm
+18.4
ppm/year
Atmospheric CH₄
1934.91 ppb
+9.11
ppb/year
Global Temperature
+1.48 °C
Peak: +1.73°C
World Population
8.1 billion
+67
million/year