SALT is a project co-financed by the European Commission and Italian Ministry for the Environment and Land and Sea aiming at the “Sustainable Management of the Esino river basin to prevent saline intrusion in the coastal aquifer in consideration of climate changes”

• Total budget: 1,453,112 Euros
• Ministry for the Environment contribution: 540,000 Euros
• European Commission contribution: 705,434 Euros
• Term: 36 months

A proper management of the problem of seawater intrusion needs first of all an in-depth knowledge of this phenomenon. It is necessary to examine the causes accelerating the process and define the feasible interventions to delay it. Particularly, it is necessary to find out the instruments to foresee the interface movement owing to the exploitation of the aquifer and natural and/or artificial recharge phenomena.

The approach for a correct assessment of sea water intrusion phenomenon comprises the following project stages:

1. data collection and GIS creation;
2. monitoring (Esino River flows/quality, groundwater table height, vertical conductibility, raining, geochemical analyses, tides);
3. river and groundwater table modelling + calibration;
4. performance analysis;
5. identification of meteorological time series of IPCC climate changes (European Directive no. 61/96 “Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control”)
6. future scenario simulation and intervention guidelines
7. supporting procedure development for groundwater table management