*5.2. Groundwater Resilience*

The evaluation of simulated scenarios indicates mixed results for groundwater resilience related to the policy tested. Folke et al. [51] defined resilience as both the capacity to undertake continuous changes and the ability to develop unceasingly. In light of this definition, groundwater resilience is not increased. Results sugges<sup>t</sup> that IE policy could reduce groundwater dependency in the short-term, but this effect is diminished as time progresses. In simulations, net increases in agricultural water demand and reduced surface water supply and precipitation eventually lead to net groundwater mining and even reduced aquifer storage. Even though the GW dependency decreases, the total amount of groundwater withdrawals may increase because of increasing agricultural water demand. The incentives to grow higher water use crops lead to agricultural water demand increase in simulations for ensuring agricultural profits with increasing ET caused by higher temperature. The LRG region's growing season is also longer than the surface water irrigation season. Regardless of surface water supply, irrigation in the LRG region is dependent upon groundwater at times. Increases in agricultural water demand (Table 4) show that IE policy fails to reduce total water withdrawals in times of drought without fundamental changes to current water delivery mechanisms.
