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Aquifer characterization using shallow geophysics in the Keritis Basin of Western Crete, Greece

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Abstract

Effective management of groundwater resources is a well-known problem in several areas around the world. It is especially important to areas suffering from an intrinsic lack of fresh water, such as islands. Detailed study of available aquifers is of particular interest in the highly touristic Greek island of Crete. The increasing water demand makes water resources management extremely important for sustainable development. This is the case in the prefecture of Chania in Western Crete, where there has been a lack of success of many different groundwater management plans that have been produced over the years and submitted for application to water management authority. The inefficiency of the management plans is verified by the continuous water shortage reported every year which forces the public authorities to transfer water from far away sources and wells. Until today there are only geological data as well as information from the borehole logs; therefore, the current work is focused to study in detail the tectonic and hydrogeological characteristics of the Keritis watershed to make a correlation of the available geoenvironmental information with the geophysical data of the study aquifer. Transient electromagnetic soundings were conducted to obtain detailed information about: the tectonic, hydrogeological, hydrolithological, and geometrical characteristics of the aquifer under investigation. In addition, optimum areas of water well drilling were identified to minimize the uncertainty and the total cost (economical, managerial, etc.) of future groundwater surveys.

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Acknowledgments

This project is implemented through the Operational Program “Education and Lifelong Learning”, Action Archimedes III and is co-financed by the European Union (European Social Fund) and Greek national funds (National Strategic Reference Framework 2007–2013), project title: Interdisciplinary study for exploring, understanding and management of groundwater resources. Pilot field investigation North-Western and Central Crete (AQUADAM). The authors are grateful to Ilias Papadopoulos, Panayioti Kanellopoulos, Panayiota Sarridou and Georgia Pegga, collaborators at TEI of Crete, for the great help during the TDEM data acquisition. A. Kanta and P. Soupios wish to thank Dr. K. Vozinakis (principal geologist of Water Management Authority in Chania Prefecture) and Profs. N. Nikolaidis and G. Karatzas for the data provision and other useful information which helped in the completion of this work. We would also like to thank the Assoc. editor, Prof. D. Fratta and five reviewers for their constructive comments and suggestions which helped to improve the manuscript.

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  1. Department of Natural Resources and Environment, Technological Educational Institute of Crete, 3 Romanou, Chalepa, 73133, Chania, Crete, Greece

    Asimina Kanta, Pantelis Soupios, Maria Kouli & Filippos Vallianatos

  2. Geoelectromagnetic Research Centre IPE RAS, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

    Pavel Barsukov

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  1. Asimina Kanta
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  2. Pantelis Soupios
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Correspondence to Pantelis Soupios.

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Kanta, A., Soupios, P., Barsukov, P. et al. Aquifer characterization using shallow geophysics in the Keritis Basin of Western Crete, Greece. Environ Earth Sci 70, 2153–2165 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-013-2503-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-013-2503-z

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