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The bedrock in Sweden is predominantly of crystalline origin and its potential to serve as water supply is often limited due to low effective porosity. Consequently, the regolith (Quaternary deposits) constitute the main water supplies.A programme for national monitoring of groundwater in Sweden started in the late 1960's. The monitoring data are evaluated on monthly basis to assess groundwater situation, but the data could also be used to predict water scarcity. The south-eastern part of Sweden had extremely low groundwater levels during the period 2016 – 2018, which affected both private water wells and municipal water supply. These droughts demonstrated the need to coordinate the responsibilities between national and regional authorities to facilitate exchange of information and support risk management. However, improving the risk assessment necessitates increasing the number of monitoring sites and the use of modelling to predict groundwater levels. This is particularly important for the south-eastern part of Sweden where climate scenarios indicate decreased groundwater recharge. As the result, a project has been initiated to increase the spatial density of monitoring stations, and to introduce numerical modelling as a tool for forecasting droughts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recovery from anthropogenic acidification in streams and lakes is well documented across the northern hemisphere. In this study, we use 1996-2009 data from the four Swedish Integrated Monitoring catchments to evaluate how the declining sulfur deposition has affected sulfate, pH, acid neutralizing capacity, ionic strength, aluminum, and dissolved organic carbon in soil water, groundwater and runoff. Differences in recovery rates between catchments, between recharge and discharge areas and between soil water and groundwater are assessed. At the IM sites, atmospheric deposition is the main human impact. The chemical trends were weakly correlated to the sulfur deposition decline. Other factors, such as marine influence and catchment features, seem to be as important. Except for pH and DOC, soil water and groundwater showed similar trends. Discharge areas acted as buffers, dampening the trends in streamwater. Further monitoring and modeling of these hydraulically active sites should be encouraged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]