Toward a coastal ground-water typology

Although submarine ground-water discharge is recognised as being of physical and ecological significance, direct measurements are rare, and calculations are hampered by a lack of offshore data. Classification of the world's coast with respect to its potential, submarine ground-water contribution would help to focus attention on the most important areas and to extrapolate existing data. A classification may be based on relevant physical/climatological parameters (e.g. precipitation, soil type etc.), or geologic/geomorphic classes (e.g. karst, coastal plain, etc.), or on a collection of state parameters. State parameters for a coastal ground-water typology may include aquifer thickness, onshore hydraulic gradient, anisotropy and fractal dimension of the shoreline. Topographic gradient can serve as a surrogate for the hydraulic gradient. A fourth type of classification may be based on the distribution of salinity in the subterranean estuary but adequate subsurface data are not yet available. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.