摘要
A series of environmental-geological problems have been caused by the over-exploitation of deep groundwater (i.e., confined aquifer water) in the North China Plain. In order to better understand the status of deep groundwater over-exploitation and the induced environmental-geological problems on a regional scale, the over-exploitation of groundwater has been assessed through the calculation of groundwater exploitation potential coefficient (i.e.,the ratio of exploitable amount of deep groundwater to current exploitation), land subsidence amount, and long-term average declining rate of groundwater table. The results show that there is a good correlation among the results by different methods. On a regional scale, deep groundwater has been over-exploited and there is no further exploitation potential under the current condition. The groundwater exploitation degree index takes the exploitation in 2003 as the reference for calculation, so the result mainly reflects the current groundwater exploitation degree.