Characteristics of groundwater drought and its correlation with meteorological and agricultural drought over the North China Plain based on GRACE

Groundwater drought is distinctive comparing with other droughts, featuring high concealment, long duration, and obvious hysteresis. It may have significant negative effects on agriculture, eco-environment, and social economy sectors. Therefore, investigating the temporal and spatial characteristics of groundwater drought and its driving factors is meaningful for monitoring and assessing the risks of groundwater shortage. In this study, a groundwater drought index based on groundwater storage anomalies (GWSAs) derived from GRACE satellites was developed to detect and analyze drought events. The spatiotemporal variations and trends of historical groundwater droughts from 2002 to 2021 in the North China Plain were evaluated. In addition, the correlations between groundwater drought and meteorological and agricultural drought were analyzed by the detrended cross-correlation analysis. The results indicated that (1) the standardized groundwater storage anomaly index (SGSAI) could better identify and characterize groundwater drought by eliminating the spatial heterogeneity of GWSAs; (2) from 2002 to 2021, the intensity, frequency, duration, and area of groundwater drought showed an increasing trend; (3) groundwater drought had an obvious hysteresis (>9 months) to meteorological drought and the correlation between groundwater drought and meteorological drought increased, while the relationship with agricultural drought decreased; (4) long-term overexploitation of groundwater resources might be the main driving factor for the exacerbating groundwater drought in this area.