ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Distribution Characteristics of Groundwater Table
in the Nagqu River Basin,
Central Qinghai-Tibet Plateau
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1
State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, China Institute of Water Resources
and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100038, China
2
Yinshanbeilu National Field Research Station of steppe Eco-hydrological System, China Institute of Water Resources
and Hydropower Research, Hohhot 010020, China
3
China Fire and Rescue Institute, Beijing, 102202, China
4
Engineering Research Center of Eco-Environment in TGR Region, Ministry of Education, College of Hydraulic
& Environmental Engineering, China Three Gorges University, Yichang 443002, China
5
Department of Hydraulic Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Submission date: 2023-03-02
Final revision date: 2023-05-26
Acceptance date: 2023-06-26
Online publication date: 2023-07-31
Publication date: 2023-09-08
Corresponding author
Baisha Weng
State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, China
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2023;32(5):4851-4864
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ABSTRACT
Alpine regions’ groundwater is crucial to the worldwide hydrological cycle. However, due to
the harsh environmental conditions, the distribution and evolution characteristics await clarification.
The study area was selected to be the Nagqu River Basin in the Nu-Salween River’s source region.
In 2019-2021, we gathered 88,000 monitoring data from nine observation wells and examined the
spatiotemporal groundwater table changes in various permafrost zones and freeze-thaw cycles. During
the freezing period, entirely frozen period, thawing period, and entirely thawed period, the groundwater
table change rates in the permafrost zone were 2.14, 1.54, 1.55, and 2.01 times larger than in the
seasonal frost zone, and fluctuation amplitudes were 1.97, 1.28, 1.01 and 1.31 times larger. The average
groundwater table change rate and fluctuation amplitude were greatest during the entirely thawed period
and lowest during the thawing period, with the maximum change rate reaching 3.64 cm/d during the
entirely thawed period of 2019-2020 in the permafrost zone and the minimum change rate of 0.12 cm/d
during the thawing period of 2019-2020 in the seasonal frost zone.