لخّصلي

Groundwater resources in Jordan are the main source for domestic water supply.Those are the Disi basin and a portion of the Jafer basin with a safe yield ranging from 107-110 MCM as estimated by NWMP (2003), or 143 MCM as reported by the annual water budget published by MWI.Over-exploitation occurs in ten out of twelve basins and is especially significant in the AmmanZarqa, Dead Sea, Azraq and Yarmouk basins; the two remaining basins are remotely located thus preventing their over-exploitation.Groundwater over-exploitation leads to declining groundwater levels by an average of about a meter a year in most aquifers, decreasing the base flow and the flow of spring discharge, and drying up springs.Almost all domestic use in Jordan is based on groundwater except West Amman where the source of water for domestic use is King Abdulla Canal.Additionally, there are other non-renewable groundwater basins that are exploited to meet the growing water demand.The high water demand was met by over-abstracting the renewable groundwater aquifers.Due to the growing water demand, almost all groundwater resources in Jordan are over-exploited which leads to the deterioration of groundwater quality.Over abstraction is estimated at about 35% above the safe yield according to the 2015 water budget.The following aspect will be discussed in more details.

Groundwater resources in Jordan are the main source for domestic water supply. Almost all
domestic use in Jordan is based on groundwater except West Amman where the source of
water for domestic use is King Abdulla Canal. Due to the growing water demand, almost all
groundwater resources in Jordan are over-exploited which leads to the deterioration of
groundwater quality. The high water demand was met by over-abstracting the renewable
groundwater aquifers. Over abstraction is estimated at about 35% above the safe yield
according to the 2015 water budget. Additionally, there are other non-renewable groundwater
basins that are exploited to meet the growing water demand. Those are the Disi basin and a
portion of the Jafer basin with a safe yield ranging from 107-110 MCM as estimated by NWMP
(2003), or 143 MCM as reported by the annual water budget published by MWI. The following
aspect will be discussed in more details.
Over-exploitation occurs in ten out of twelve basins and is especially significant in the AmmanZarqa, Dead Sea, Azraq and Yarmouk basins; the two remaining basins are remotely located thus
preventing their over-exploitation. Groundwater over-exploitation leads to declining
groundwater levels by an average of about a meter a year in most aquifers, decreasing the base
flow and the flow of spring discharge, and drying up springs. This leads to the deterioration of
water quality, increase in cost of securing water, and a loss of about a third of Jordan's "strategic
reserve" of water by 2030.
By providing reasonable volumes of water for municipal and commercial needs, water use in
Jordan has exceeded the safe yields for a number of years and exceeds renewable supply. The
GOJ provides high quality and reasonable volumes of water for human and commercial needs
which unfortunately has the side effect of depleting the country's groundwater reserves.
Table 7 represents a summary for Table 46, Table 47 and Table 48 in the Annex. It shows that
the groundwater use from renewable sources for the municipal sector increased from 179 MCM
during the period (1994-2009) to 205 MCM as an average during the period 2010-2013 with an
increase of 15%, while it decreased for the industrial and the irrigation sector by 15% and 3%,
respectively. For the non-renewable groundwater resources, the uses increased by 133% for the
municipal sector and increased by 19% for the industrial sector, while it decreased by 13% for
the irrigation sector. Generally, it could be noted that the use of renewable groundwater
resources was increased by 3% while in the case of non-renewable groundwater resources the
percentage use was increased by 17%. This represents a real threat to non-renewable
groundwater resources. It can also be seen that there are still many illegal wells that need to be
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controlled and prevented from pumping groundwater illegally. Further elaboration of these
aspects is presented in the subsequent sections.