Water in the Chartreuse, a mirror reflecting a renewal of relationships between mountains areas and their surrounding towns

23/03/2016

Like the forest, water is abundant in Chartreuse. Water is an iconic resource of the massif, one of the wettest of France’s mountainous regions. The Chartreuse is drained by the two Guiers Rivers (‘Mort’ and ‘Vif’) and was made a regional nature park (RNP) in Isère/Savoie in 1995. Figure 1. Location and physio-hydrography of the Chartreuse RNP Source: SIT PNRC Despite this natural abundance, access to water resources in Chartreuse, as elsewhere, is currently under threat. At a time when the first effects of climate change are being felt, “time lags, gaps between average resource volumes and withdrawals, spot shortages” (Fabre, 2012, p.28) and the “spatial and temporal patterns of some forms of water use result in pressures (...) and sometimes challenge the principle of compatibility of different water uses” (Charnay, 2010, p.18). The 2009 MEEDDM report on the assessment of the cost of and adaptation to the impacts of climate change in France shows that “whereas a stable demand, a defi...

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