Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

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Engineering Geology
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enggeo

Assessment of long-term ground subsidence and groundwater depletion in

Hanoi, Vietnam
Minh Nguyen a, b, Yunung Nina Lin b, *, Quoc Cuong Tran c, Chuen-Fa Ni d, Yu-Chang Chan b,
Kuo-Hsin Tseng e, Chung-Pai Chang e
a
Earth System Science, Taiwan International Graduate Program, Academia Sinica, Taipei City, Taiwan
b
Institute of Earth Sciences, Academia Sinica, Taipei City, Taiwan
c
Institute of Geological Sciences, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam
d
Graduate Institute of Applied Geology, National Central University, Taoyuan City, Taiwan
e
Center for Space and Remote Sensing Research, National Central University, Taoyuan City, Taiwan

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Rapid urbanization and population growth in Hanoi city raise the demand for groundwater and the risk of land
Ground subsidence subsidence. This study is the first to conduct a long-term interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR)
InSAR analysis with different SAR sensors including ALOS, COSMO-SkyMed and Sentinel-1 to evaluate the spatio­
Diffusion model
temporal evolution of subsidence in Hanoi between 2007 and 2018. The results show that subsidence in Central
South East Asian sinking cities
Hanoi had been diminishing during these 12 years, while the southern and western outskirts (Ha Dong and Hoai
Duc district) had become hot spots with peak rates of ~50 mm/yr. We further model the subsidence time-series
with 22 years of piezometric records to estimate hydrogeological properties in the area. The modeling yields a
mean consolidation coefficient of 0.56 m2/yr, a value typical for aquitards composed of >90% fine-grain ma­
terials. The model also predicts another 0.5–1.3 m of subsidence in Ha Dong by the end of this century. Based on
these results, we propose zoning for subsidence susceptibility as the basis for future groundwater management in
Hanoi. From a regional perspective, Hanoi is relatively less affected by land subsidence compared to other South
East Asian cities due to geotechnical factors including small consolidation coefficients, as well as social factors
such as lower population density.

1. Introduction
Urban subsidence has become a prominent issue in several Asian
cities due to rapid development and population growth (Abidin et al.,
2011; Ge et al., 2014; van der Horst et al., 2018). Hanoi, the national
capital in Vietnam, is no exception. The Hanoi metropolitan, home to
7.5 million people nowadays, began to see accelerated expansion since
the merging with adjacent counties in 2008 (GSO, 2019). According to
the time-lapse images available on Google Earth, the Hanoi urban area
nearly tripled during the past two decades. Groundwater withdrawal in
Hanoi city also shows an accompanying growth. Activation of the Hoa
Binh dam along the Da River in 2009 had complemented 23% of total
water supply (Hoang et al., 2017a; Tam and Nga, 2018), yet the amount
of groundwater pumped still continued to increase since then.
Groundwater abstraction from the main aquifer increased from 241,000
m3/day in 1995 to 787,000 m3/day in 2016 according to official
pumping records (Nguyen et al., 2018). In 2018, the total water
extraction from all aquifers is estimated to be >1.1 million m3/day when
further accounting for undocumented pumping (Nguyen et al., 2018).
The increase in pumping activities raise the concern for land subsi­
dence. Early studies using leveling measurements showed a mean sub­
sidence rate of 20 mm/yr in Central Hanoi between 1996 and 2012
(Dao, 2011). The subsidence pattern was better revealed by the inter­
ferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) study using the L-band
Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) data from 2007 to 2011
(Dang et al., 2014). Their result further showed a high spatial correlation
with both the decline of groundwater levels in the Pleistocene aquifer
and the distribution of fine-grained materials in some outskirt areas such
as the Hoang Mai district (southeast of Central Hanoi). Later, Le et al.
(2016) used the X-band TerraSAR-X (TSX) imagery to measure the
subsidence of small-scale features such as historical places in Central
Hanoi due to nearby constructions between 2012 and 2013. Minh et al.

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: ninalin@earth.sinica.edu.tw (Y.N. Lin).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enggeo.2022.106555
Received 28 September 2021; Received in revised form 24 January 2022; Accepted 29 January 2022
Available online 4 February 2022
0013-7952/© 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

(2019) used both the X-band COSMO-SkyMed (CSK) and TSX acquired
between 2011 and 2014 to produce a high-resolution subsidence map,
and obtained a mean subsidence rate of 25 mm/yr in Central Hanoi.
They also found the subsidence pattern comparable to the groundwater
fluctuation within the Pleistocene aquifer (qp). Despite the detailed
depiction of ground subsidence and its correlation with groundwater
level changes, the aforementioned studies mostly covered a short time
span (3–5 years). Moreover, most studies do not provide insights about
the hydrogeological linkage between subsidence and groundwater level
changes, such as specific storage and consolidation coefficient of the
aquifer system. These parameters, however, are key to the modeling of
current/future subsidence and the efficient management of groundwater
resources in the area.
Former attempts to model the aquifer system in Hanoi mainly
address the subsurface flow and depression of heads from the perspec­
tive of water resource management (Bui et al., 2012; Glass et al., 2018).
Among those studies, Thu and Fredlund (2000) was one of the few who
focused on the subsidence issue. They utilized well logs to construct a 3D
stratigraphic model for numerical modeling (using MODFLOW pro­
gram), and used the head measurements between 1988 and 1995 to
calibrate the hydrogeological parameters including hydraulic conduc­
tivity, specific yield and specific storage. They also performed stress-
deformation modeling and subsidence prediction on two pumping
fields based on drained Young’s modulus obtained from geotechnical
experiments. However, given the dependency on accurate boundary
conditions and the nonhomogeneous material properties throughout the
area, this modeling-intensive method is feasible only in places with good
stratigraphic controls and sufficient soil information. Another potential
issue is to model deformation by using the modulus of elasticity, while
the actual land subsidence may be more likely a combination of elastic
and inelastic processes.
This study is the first to reconstruct the long-term spatiotemporal
evolution of surface subsidence in Hanoi. We produce a continuous 12-
year ground deformation time-series between 2007 and 2018 using data
from different SAR sensors, including ALOS, CSK and the C-band
Sentinel-1. We also analyze 22 years of piezometric head data from 19
active wells (Hoang et al., 2017b; Nguyen et al., 2018) to derive the
amount and pattern of head variations. To examine the linkage between
ground subsidence and head changes, we adopt a 1D coupled diffusion
model to estimate the hydrogeological parameters in the area. Despite a
rather simple method compared to the 3D MODFLOW program, the 1D
model can still provide a first-order estimate of the key parameters,
which may serve as effective initial values for future 3D modeling. We
then propose zoning of subsidence susceptibility as the basis for
groundwater management in Hanoi. Finally, the subsidence rates in
Hanoi are compared with those from other South East Asian cities in
order to gain more insights from a regional perspective.
2. Study area
The study area is located at the center of the Red River basin, with
elevations ranging from 5 to 20 m above sea level according to the
Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) digital elevation model
(DEM) (Farr et al., 2007) (Fig. 1a, b). While the Red River is the primary
source for water supply in the Hanoi region, groundwater plays the main
role in providing household water uses before 2009 (Bui et al., 2012).
Over the pumping wells operated by the public sector, groundwater is
mainly extracted from two aquifers (Fig. 1b): the Upper Pleistocene
aquifer (qp2), composed of median-sized sands, pebbles and cobbles,
and the Lower Pleistocene aquifer (qp1), composed of mainly gravels
(Vu and Merkel, 2019). qp2 and qp1 together account for 98.7% of the
total groundwater production, among which 97% comes from qp1 alone
(Nguyen et al., 2018). Above qp2 is the unconfined Holocene aquifer
(qh), composed of fine-grained sands and clay with an averaged thick­
ness of 13 m. The bottommost layer is the Neogene aquifer (n), with the
top approximately 80 m below surface. Sandwiched in between qh and

Fig. 1. (a) Base map of the Red River basin in northern Vietnam. (b) Location of the Central Hanoi and four adjacent districts. Background image: Sentinel-2 imagery
on 6 October 2016. (c) Profiles (AA′ and BB′ ) showing the hydrogeological setting in the Hanoi Basin (Bui et al., 2012; Tam and Nga, 2018) at the same horizontal
scale. qh: Holocene; qp2: Upper Pleistocene; qp1: Lower Pleistocene. Note the bottom of profile A-A’ reflects the maximum drilling depth instead of the base of
geological units. The deepest unit, the Neogene aquifer, is beyond the display range of the profiles. An aquitard layer 14–16 m thick is identified in between qh and qp
(qp2 or qp1) (Tam and Nga, 2018). (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

2
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

n, the qp1 and qp2 layer together have an average thickness of 60 m. The
geological cross-sections constructed from well logs reveal lateral vari­
ations in the qp1 thickness. According to profile B-B′ , the thickness de­
creases from 50 m at the southeast to 20 m at the northwest (Fig. 1c)
(Tam and Nga, 2018). The depth of the qp1 top is shallower both at the
southeast and the northwest, ~20 m below sea level, and deeper in
Central Hanoi, ~40 m below sea level.
In addition to the four aquifer layers in Hanoi, there is one distinct
aquitard layer between qh and qp. The thickness of this confining layer
is ~14–16 m, and the layer is composed of fine-grained mixtures
including sand, silt and clay (Tam and Nga, 2018). The lateral extension
and/or sealing effect of this aquitard layer is not contiguous throughout
the entire region, leaving occasional hydraulic windows where similar
head variations between qh and qp1 can be observed (see Section 4.2).
3. Data and method
3.1. Surface subsidence from InSAR
3.1.1. InSAR time-series analysis
We utilize three SAR sensors including ALOS, CSK and Sentinel-1 to
obtain continuous InSAR displacement time-series between February
2007 and September 2018. We process three SAR datasets using
different workflows tailored to their individual acquisition specifica­
tions (Table 1). ALOS and CSK images both have long spatial and tem­
poral baselines, so we combine the single-master persistent scatterer
(PS) approach and the multi-master distributed scatterer (DS) approach
for better data quality and a larger spatial coverage. The processing is
done with the StaMPS package (Hooper, 2008; Hooper et al., 2007).
Sentinel-1 images on the other hand have small baselines both in
time and in space. We adopt the DS-based, multi-master small baseline
subset (SBAS) (Berardino et al., 2002) approach implemented in the
GIAnT package (Agram et al., 2013). Compared to the PS-based method,
the multi-master nature of SBAS allows a higher point density
throughout the 3.5-year-long stack. The drawbacks are, however, the
potential contamination of systematic noises associated with fading
signals due to multilooking (Ansari et al., 2020; De Zan and Gomba,
2018), as well as the longer computing time due to the large number of
redundant interferometric pairs required to mitigate such systematic
noises. To find the balance between noise reduction and computing ef­
ficiency, we adopt the following pairing strategy:
Δti = 2i− 1 × T, i = 1, 2, …, 6
of 6 interferometric pairs whose temporal baselines increase exponen­
tially instead of linearly. The maximum temporal baseline that we adopt
is 384 days at i = 6. Despite the reduced coherence, interferograms with
long temporal baselines are found to be critical in reducing the bias in
velocity estimates (Ansari et al., 2017; Ansari et al., 2020). We had
compared the velocities made from this proposed pairing strategy with
those made from pairs of short temporal baselines only (with temporal
baselines ≤24 days). The latter yields larger subsidence rates by 30%
compared to the results from the former, suggesting an excess-phase bias
as seen in other vegetated areas (Ansari et al., 2020).
For all three InSAR time-series datasets, we carry out tropospheric
correction by using the method proposed by Jolivet et al. (2014) with
ERA-5 hourly data as the input weather model (Hersbach et al., 2020).
We then re-reference all three time-series to a 5-by-5 patch located over
a stable sandstone layer, the same site adopted by Tran (2016) (Fig. 1b).
Next, we convert the line-of-sight (LOS) displacement dLOS to vertical
displacement dU. The relationship between dLOS and dU is (Hanssen,
2001):
dLOS = dN SN + dE SE + dU SU (2)
where SN, SE, SU are coefficients for projecting the east, north and ver­
tical components into the LOS direction, and dN, dE, dU are the north,
east and vertical displacement fields. As the horizontal velocities from 6
Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) campaign stations around
Hanoi (Tran, 2016) show little variation across the region (Fig. 1a;
Table 2), we carry out linear interpolation of the VE and VN fields
directly. With them we compute the equivalent dE and dN at SAR epochs
with respect to the same reference patch as InSAR. We then project the
horizontal displacements onto the LOS direction, and subtract them
from the InSAR LOS displacements in order to obtain dU:
dLOS − (dE SE + dN SN ) dLOS − (dE SE + dN SN )
dU = = (3)
SU cosθ
where θ is the incidence angle for each sensor. We further decompose dU
time-series into long-term trends (dU_LT) and seasonal components
(dU_seasonal):
dU = dU LT + dU seasonal + dε
∑ ∑2 [ ]
2πt 2π t (4)
= κj t + ai cos
τi
+ bi sin
τi
+ dε
j i=1
{
ϑj if Tj ≤ t < Tj+1
κj =
(1) 0 else

where Δti is the temporal baseline for the i-th interferometric pair made where dε stands for unmodeled errors, ϑj is the velocity during the period
of the same master, and T is the repeat time for the SAR sensor (12 days of Tj and Tj+1. ai and bi are the amplitude of the cosine and sine basis
for Sentinel-1 in Hanoi). For each master image we generate a maximum functions that represent the sinusoidal annual and semi-annual (τ1=1
year and τ2=half year) changes. To capture the velocity changes, we fit
the dU_LT with multiple linear segments. Currently the segmentation
Table 1
points Tj for long-term trends are determined visually. To confirm the
Technical specifications of three SAR sensors used in the study and interfero­
necessity of any change of trend, we adopt a segmentation point only
metric processing details.
when the resultant root-mean-squared error between the observed and
ALOS CSK 1 & 3 Sentinel-1 modeled records reduces by 2 times compared to when no such
Radar band L-band (23.6 cm) X-band (3.1 cm) C-band (5.6 cm)
Orbit direction Ascending Ascending Descending
Time period Feb/2007–Feb/ Jul/2011–Jun/ Mar/2015–Sep/
Table 2
2011 2015 2018
Polarization HH HH VV
Average north (VN), east (VE) and vertical (VU) velocities in mm/yr based on
Look angle (◦ ) 38.7–40.6 25.8–28.2 38.2–40.7 GNSS campaign measurements taken in 2005, 2006, 2013, and 2015 (Tran,
Spat. baseline (m) 6–1539 4–363 1–187 2016). All velocities are in ITRF2005 reference frame and averaged over mul­
Temp. baseline 46–1058 32–720 6–384 tiple campaign years. See Fig. 1a for station locations.
(day)
ID Station VN VE VU Year of campaign
#epoch 22 17 98
#interferogram 47 34 550 02 HN02 0.4 0.2 − 0.8 2005, 2006, 2013, 2015
Method PS + DS PS + DS DS (SBAS) 03 HN03 − 0.3 1.2 − 2.6 2005, 2006, 2013
(PSInSAR) 04 HN04 0.4 − 0.4 − 4.8 2005, 2006, 2013, 2015
Software ISCE-StaMPS ISCE-StaMPS ISCE-GIAnT 06 HN06 0.8 0.4 0.3 2005, 2006, 2013
Pairing strategy Single & Multi- Single & Multi- Multi-Master 07 HN07 0.0 − 0.1 1.3 2005, 2006, 2013, 2015
Master Master 08 HN08 − 0.1 0.6 − 1.4 2005, 2006, 2013

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M. Nguyen et al.
segmentation is adopted. In the 1D coupled model (Section 3.3), we
would focus on the long-term deformation by excluding the short-term
seasonal component from the time-series:
(5)
′
dU = dU − dU seasonal
3.1.2. Validation of ground deformation
We validate the vertical displacements obtained through the afore­
mentioned flow by comparing with in-situ measurements including
leveling benchmarks, GNSS time-series and the records from the multi-
layer compaction monitoring (MLCM) well (station IGS in Fig. 1b).
Leveling measurements are conducted by the Department of Con­
struction, Hanoi City Government. The benchmarks were revisited
yearly from 2008 to 2012 for 9 sites located in our study area. We
compute the root-mean-squared difference between the average veloc­
ities obtained from leveling measurements and from ALOS InSAR time-
series for the period of 2008–2011 and CSK time-series for the period of
2011–2012.
Daily solutions for the continuous GNSS station JNAV are openly
available from the Nevada Geodetic Laboratory (Blewitt et al., 2018).
We compare the vertical displacement time-series of JNAV between
January 2014 and April 2018 with the combined InSAR time-series from
CSK and Sentinel-1.
The MLCM well is installed by the Institute of Geological Sciences
(IGS), Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology in 2011. It uses
rings mounted at different layers and vibrating wire displacement sen­
sors to automatically measure the change in depth between the ground
surface and the rings. There are in total three layers measured at this
well, with the deepest level at 44 m below surface (5 m into qp1). The
temporal sampling rate was every 4 h since 2013. We resample the time-
series from February 2013 to March 2018 into monthly records for an
easier comparison with the InSAR time-series.
3.2. Groundwater level changes
Managed by the National Center for Water Resources Planning and
Investigation (NAWAPI) (NAWAPI, 2008), the groundwater monitoring
network in Hanoi (Fig. 2) started to provide continuous monthly records
Fig. 2. Network of monitoring wells in Hanoi with monthly readings of multiple groundwater levels, and the distribution of public pumping sites (circles in white-to-
red colors). The pumping volume in display is for the year of 2014 (NAWAPI, 2008). (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is
referred to the web version of this article.)
4
Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555
of multi-layer piezometric heads since the 1990s. The records for most
qp and qh aquifers started from the year of 1997, while records for the n
aquifer started as late as 2010. In this study, we mainly analyze the data
between January 1997 and September 2018, including qh heads from 14
wells, qp2 heads from 5 wells, qp1 heads from 18 wells and n heads from
4 wells in order to understand the spatiotemporal change of ground­
water levels.
Influenced by seasonal discharge and recharge, the piezometric re­
cords show strong variations as large as 3 m between the peak during the
wet season (May to October) and the trough during the dry season
(November to April) (Vu and Merkel, 2019). Since land subsidence is
more related to the long-term change of groundwater levels, we conduct
a similar parameterized least-squared fit to the piezometric time-series h
as the formulation in (4):
h = hLT + hseasonal + hε (6)
where the long-term trend hLT is also composed of multiple linear seg­
ments, and the seasonal term hseasonal is fitted by sinusoidal functions
including both annual and semi-annual cycles. After fitting the time-
series with (6), we use only the hLT term in the 1D coupled model to
focus on the land subsidence associated with long-term water storage
losses.
To allow easier spatial comparison among different datasets, we also
arrange the groundwater level time-series into the observation periods
of the three SAR time-series – 2007–2011, 2011–2015 and 2015–2018.
This strategy avoids mixing of SAR measurements from different sen­
sors, and hence preserves the characteristics of errors associated with
different radar wavelengths, sensing geometry and time-series process­
ing flows.
3.3. 1D coupled diffusion model
3.3.1. Correction of long-term elastic deformation
Previous studies show that both aquifers and aquitards collapse/
compact in response to the decrease of piezometric heads and the in­
crease of effective stress (Béjar-Pizarro et al., 2017; Galloway et al.,
1999; Helm, 1975; Hung et al., 2012; Smith et al., 2017). Aquifers tend
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

to deform elastically due to stronger granular support among the coarse- Thanh Cong (TC) and Phap Van (PV), as well as the IGS MLCM station
grained materials, and may eventually rebound when the ground water (Fig. 1b), come with monthly deformation measurements and head level
level resumes. Aquitards on the other hand tend to experience inelastic records (Nhan et al., 2019). These data grant us the chance to evaluate
deformation due to the re-alignment (compaction) of fine-grained the elastic responses in the first place. We remove the linear trends from
minerals such as clay, resulting in the permanent loss of pore space. the deformation time-series and the head records, and then make stress-
The total vertical ground deformation dU can then be decomposed into strain (head level-deformation) plots using the detrended data (Fig. 3).
the following components: When the trajectory forms loops along a particular slope, it means the
deformation is recovered after the stress is lifted - a typical behavior of
dU = dU e + dU in (7)
elastic deformation (Béjar-Pizarro et al., 2017; Hung et al., 2012; Hung
where dUe and dUin are the elastic and inelastic component respectively. et al., 2021). We then fit a line over the points on the stress-strain plot,
The vertical ground deformation can be linked to the specific skeletal with the inverse slope representing the elastic skeletal storage. By
storage via (Smith et al., 2017): normalizing this value with aquifer thickness, we can obtain the elastic
specific skeletal storage (Sske) value.
dU e = Sske (b0e he ) (8) The Sske values thus derived are shown in Table 3. Despite different
locations (PV in Hoang Mai and the other two in Central Hanoi) and
dU in = Sskv (b0in hin ) (9) temporal coverage (from 1996 to 2018), these Sske values are within the
same order of magnitude. The small and consistent values (averaged at
where the contribution from water compression is ignored. Sske and Sskv 5.8 × 10− 5 m− 1) suggest little elastic response to head changes: at
are the elastic and inelastic specific skeletal storage (in m− 1), b0e and b0in Δhe=1 m and b0e=50 m, the elastic response is only 2.9 mm. For
are the thickness of elastically and inelastically deforming layers, usu­ simplicity and as a unified source of modeling error, we use the mean
ally referring to the aquifer and aquitard thickness, respectively. he and
value Sske for the correction in all wells.
hin represent the head above and below the preconsolidation head level
that induces the elastic and inelastic deformation within the aquifer
3.3.2. Modeling of long-term inelastic deformation
system.
Now with dU′′ as a more realistic inelastic deformation time-series,
Recall in (5) that we have already removed seasonal variations from
we can evaluate Sskv which is associated with the compaction within
the InSAR deformation time-series, and hence dU′ should be mainly the
aquitards. The 1D diffusion model is defined as (Helm, 1975; Smith
long-term deformation with some unmodeled errors. While it may be
et al., 2017):
convenient to assume that the 12 years of long-term deformation is
( )
entirely inelastic, some studies have shown that the subsidence trend ∂ ∂h ∂h
Kv = Sskv (11)
measured within a short time span (such as 5 years) may be elastic and ∂z ∂z ∂t
recoverable along with the heaving of water heads from a multi-decadal
perspective (Béjar-Pizarro et al., 2017). Rather than the two extremes
(purely inelastic or elastic), it is more likely that the long-term defor­
Table 3
mation that we obtained from InSAR is somewhere in between. To
Estimate elastic skeletal storage (Sske) values in PV, TC and IGS station in
obtain a more realistic (or conservative) estimate of inelastic subsidence different periods.
for 1D modeling, we can carry out the following correction:
Station Sske (m− 1) Period
(10)
′′ ′
dU = dU − Sske (b0e hLT ) PV 5.3 × 10− 5
1996–2001
5
TC 7.8 × 10− 1997–2001
The elastic skeletal storage Sske can be determined by the cyclic TC 3.8 × 10− 5
2008–2012
deformation responses to seasonal head changes. However, InSAR data IGS 6.2 × 10− 5
2013–2018
are coarsely sampled in time and do not allow a proper recovery of the Mean value (Sske ) 5.8 × 10− 5

seasonal deformation signals. Fortunately, two leveling benchmarks,

Fig. 3. (Left) Detrended water head and deformation time-series at the leveling benchmark Phap Van. Inset: The original deformation time-series (black solid line)
and its linear trend (black dashed line). (Right) Stress-strain plot of the detrended datasets. The dots are connected in chronological order with colors representing the
time in months since January 1996.

5
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

where Kv is the vertical hydraulic conductivity, and h is the piezometric series (dUin_mod) according to (9). To examine the goodness of fit, we
head level within the aquitard, which we consider equivalent to hin in compute the reduced Chi-square Xre2 (Chlieh et al., 2007) between these
(9). We adopt the long-term components hLT of qp1 heads as the observed (dU′′ ) and modeled deformation time-series:
boundary condition for h. We consider the aquitard between qh and qp1 ∑N
[ ’’
dU − dU in mod i
]2
as the main layer where inelastic deformation occurs, and hence b0in is
i
2 dεi
X
set to the average thickness of this layer (16 m according to Glass et al. Xre2 = = i=1 (12)
dof dof
(2018) and Tam and Nga (2018)). The modeling is based on the scenario
where the hydraulic heads stop decreasing after the end of 2018. We where X2 is the Chi-square, dof stands for the degrees of freedom (N-2 in
then carry out multiple forward models within the following parameter this case, with N stands for the total InSAR time-series epochs and the
space for Kv and Sskv: number 2 for the parameters Kv and Sskv), and dεi is the unmodeled error
Kv: 10− 7 ~ 10− 5 at an increment of 2 × 10− 7 (m/day). in (4) for the i-th epoch. A Xre2 close to one indicates the mean model
Sskv: 10− 4 ~ 10− 2 at an increment of 2 × 10− 4 (m− 1). error is at the same level as the mean observation error, which is
Given the boundary condition of hLT and different (Kv, Sskv) sets, we considered as the best solution when taking into account of observation
can obtain the time-series of h (hin) and thereby a modeled dUin time- uncertainties. We therefore select the parameter set with minimal ∣Xre2

Fig. 4. (Left column) InSAR subsidence rates for period I (2007–2011 for ALOS), period II (2011–2015 for CSK) and period III (2015–2018 for Sentinel-1). At the
same colour scale, circles and triangles represent the rates obtained from leveling and InSAR respectively. IGS is the MLCM well (black square). JNAV is a continuous
GNSS station (black triangle). (Right column) Groundwater level change rates in the qp1 aquifer for the corresponding observation periods. The rates are presented
both in colors and in circle sizes for better visualization. Note that only 14 wells are displayed in this map to focus on the Hanoi metropolitan area and the target
aquifer (qp).

6
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

− 1∣ value as the best result, and further define the lower and upper
thresholds of Xre2 corresponding to the 95% confidence interval. We
then report the standard deviation, minimum and maximum of Kv and
Sskv based on the solutions that fall within this interval.
After obtaining the best Kv and Sskv parameter set, we can compute
the time constant (τ) over which the residual compaction completes up
to 90% (Riley, 1969; Smith et al., 2017):
( )2 /
b
τ ≃ 0 Sskv Kv (13)
2

We caution that given the nature of 1D diffusion equation, the two

parameters, Kv and Sskv, are not independently resolved but are highly
correlated with each other. It is the ratio between them, known as the
coefficient of consolidation Cv (in m2/year), that can be uniquely
determined:
Cv = Kv /Sskv (14)

Cv is one of the principal soil properties constantly obtained in

geotechnical laboratory experiments (Terzaghi et al., 1996; Yamada
et al., 2019). Cv combines specific storage and hydraulic conductivity
into a single parameter and it describes the rate at which water can be
expelled from the compacted medium. Large Cv value indicates shorter
completion time or faster consolidation, whereas smaller Cv value sug­
gests slower or delayed consolidation responses, resulting in larger τ
values.

4. Results

4.1. Land subsidence

We first present the validation of subsidence rates derived from

InSAR time-series during different periods (Fig. 4). For the rates ob­
tained in 2007–2011 (period I) and 2011–2015 (period II), InSAR and
leveling rates are consistent in general, with slightly larger rates at some
leveling benchmarks. The largest discrepancy is at the benchmark Phap Fig. 5. Concatenated InSAR subsidence time-series (ALOS, CSK, Sentinel-1)
Van during period II (PV in Fig. 3), with 2.9 cm/yr from leveling and 1.7 compared with the records from MLCM (IGS station) and GNSS (JNAV station).
cm/yr from InSAR. We examine the time-lapse optical images on Google
Earth, and observe the construction of a highway nearby the benchmark (Fig. 5). At the IGS site, MLCM and InSAR time-series show similar trend
between the year of 2009 and 2012 (note that the last leveling survey between Jan 2013 and Mar 2018. As InSAR represents the total land
was conducted in 2012). Given the intensive construction work during subsidence and IGS represents the compaction within the uppermost 44
the period, it is possible that larger errors exist in either leveling or m, the agreement in trend indicates that the majority of compaction
InSAR measurements. By excluding this site, the root-mean-squared should occur within the upper qp1 aquifer and above. At the JNAV site,
difference is 5.2 mm/yr between ALOS and leveling and 2.9 mm/yr GNSS and InSAR measurements also reveal similar subsidence trends
between CSK and leveling (Table 4). Part of the remaining discrepancies with RMSE of 1.9 mm/yr (Table 4), with GNSS data showing clear
may result from different temporal coverages between InSAR time-series seasonal variations. Several factors may contribute to the lack of obvious
and leveling measurements (Table 4). In addition, the larger RMSE for seasonal patterns in the InSAR time-series, including the influence of
the ALOS period may indicate potential influence of stronger iono­ residual tropospheric delays, and the reduced resolution due to multi-
spheric noises due to the longer radar wavelength (Gomba et al., 2016). looking.
For the period of 2015–2018 (period III), as there is no leveling Now we look into the spatiotemporal variations of land subsidence in
campaign after 2012, we directly compare the concatenated InSAR the Hanoi metropolitan (Fig. 4). During period I, the southern part of
subsidence time-series with the time-series from MLCM and GNSS Central Hanoi experienced substantial subsidence, at an average rate of
12 mm/yr. The subsidence rate further increases towards the south, and
peaks at 50 mm/yr in Ha Dong and Hoang Mai. To the west in Hoai Duc,
Table 4 several sparse points also suggest subsidence rates up to 50 mm/yr.
Validation results of subsidence rates derived from InSAR time-series. During period II, the subsidence rate in Central Hanoi has reduced
InSAR time-series Validation data RMSE (mm/ significantly to <5 mm/yr. In Ha Dong, Hoai Duc and Hoang Mai,
yr) subsidence rates also eased to <25 mm/yr, <20 mm/yr and <15 mm/yr,
Leveling measurement respectively. Although leveling data also confirms the lower subsidence
ALOS (2007–2011) (2008–2011) 5.2 rates within Central Hanoi during this period, we caution that there is no
Leveling measurement
validation dataset for the systematically lower subsidence rates in the
CSK (2011–2015) (2011− 2012) 2.9
Concatenated InSAR
suburban districts.
(2013–2018) MLCM (2013–2018) 0.4 When it comes to period III, the short spatial baselines of Sentinel-1
Concatenated InSAR allow higher coherence for most interferometric pairs and thereby a
(2014–2018) GPS (2014–2018) 1.9 more complete view of the subsidence pattern in the basin. The subsi­
dence in Central Hanoi is similar to that in period II, at <5 mm/yr. The

7
M. Nguyen et al.
subsidence rate in Hoang Mai is ~20 mm/yr, much lower than that in
period I. The subsidence at Ha Dong has a similar outline as that in
period I, but at a slightly lower rate of <40 mm/yr. Eastern Hoai Duc
shows a clear hot spot during this period, up to 50 mm/yr.
To summarize, the subsidence in Central Hanoi and Hoang Mai has
greatly diminished over the past 12 years. Ha Dong continues to show
persistent land subsidence, while Hoai Duc may experience similar or
even more severe subsidence during the past 3–4 years.
4.2. Groundwater level changes
The fitted piezometric head time-series between 1997 and 2018 for
the three aquifer systems are in good agreement with the observed re­
cords (Fig. 6). Among all three aquifer systems, qp1 heads show the most
significant decrease. Some qh, qp2 and n heads remain stable with time,
while others demonstrate large level decreases. These decreases tend to
co-vary with the qp1 head levels, such as the qh heads of Q67 and Q69,
and the qp2 heads of Q62, Q63 and Q68. These co-varying head levels
indicate that the aquifers involved are not perfectly segregated around
these wells.
Next we look into the head change rates in each period in order to
compare with the subsidence patterns within the same time span
(Fig. 4). During period I, the northern part of Central Hanoi experienced
significant piezometric level drops at the maximum rate of 880 mm/yr.
Ha Dong has the second highest rate of ~550 mm/yr. During period II,
the head drop rates reduce for nearly all wells. Several heads even
demonstrate a clear rebound, such as Q64 in Central Hanoi and Q65 in
Hoang Mai. The rebound of groundwater level correlates with the lower
subsidence rates from InSAR in period II, suggesting that the difference
in subsidence rates between period II and the other two periods is likely
true. During period III, Ha Dong sees the largest head drop rates, at ~1
m/yr. One intriguing thing is that the head drop rates in Hoai Duc
Fig. 6. Piezometric head time-series for different aquifer systems: Holocene (qh), Upper Pleistocene (qp2), Lower Pleistocene (qp1) and Neogene (n). The label at the
end of each curve represents the ID for each head record, with the same number indicating data from the same well and the following letter for different layers as
used in the original NAWAPI reports. Colored lines and black lines represent fitted and observed piezometric heads. Shaded grid represent wells in the area of
interest: Hoai Duc, Central Hanoi, Hoang Mai and Ha Dong. See Fig. 2 for well locations. Vertical black lines indicate the observation starting time for ALOS, CSK and
Sentinel-1 (S1), corresponding to the onset of period I, II and III.
8
Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555
remain low for all three periods, while the subsidence rate is comparable
to that in Ha Dong. As there is no public pumping well in this district
(Fig. 2), this discrepancy suggests the existence of undocumented
pumping even before the year of 2007.
4.3. 1D compaction model
We perform 1D modeling on 11 wells whose locations are within the
SAR footprints. We also deliberately leave out the well Q67 due to its
proximity to the Red River which may incur complex hydrological
interaction between the river and the groundwater. Some examples of
modeling results are shown in Fig. 7. To acknowledge the covariance
between Kv and Sskv, we use the Cv − Xre2 plot to illustrate the solution
space. For example, in Hoang Mai, there are 8 solutions of Cv (Kv − Sskv
pairs) within the 95% confidence interval (Fig. 7b), and the predicted
subsidence time-series all agree with the data well. The standard devi­
ation of Kv and Sskv and the maximum/minimum of Cv are then calcu­
lated based on these 8 solutions. We notice that even at similar Cv values,
some (Kv, Sskv) combinations yield much larger Xre2 than those falling
within the 95% confidence interval. This result suggests that even
though the 1D diffusion model does not provide constraints for Kv and
Sskv individually, when coupled with the deformation time-series, it is
still possible to identify a more plausible range of Sskv and thereof Kv that
better explains the subsidence data.
The parameters obtained for all 11 wells are shown in Table 5 and
Fig. 8. The Sskv values are mostly in the range of 4–12 × 10− 3 m− 1, with
an average of 5.42 × 10− 3 m− 1. They are not too different from the
specific storage estimated by Thu and Fredlund (2000) using MODFLOW
(2.3 × 10− 3 m− 1 for the confining layer). These values are two orders of
magnitude larger than the Sske values obtained in this area (~10− 5 m− 1;
see Table 3). This order difference is similar to that measured in other
aquifer systems, including the Choushui River Alluvial Fan in central
M. Nguyen et al.
Fig. 7. (a) Simulation of aquitard compaction for Q65 well in Hoang Mai and (b) its Cv − Xre2 plot with corresponding thresholds for 95% confidence interval (red
dashed lines). Each gray line in (a) represents a solution parameter set of (Kv, Sskv) within the confidence interval. (c) Simulation for Q68 well in Ha Dong. (d)
Simulation for Q64 well in Central Hanoi. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
Taiwan (e.g. 10− 2 vs. 10− 4 m− 1 in Hung et al. (2012)) and San Joaquin
Valley in central California (e.g. 10− 4 vs. 10− 6 ft.− 1 in Sneed (2001)).
The Kv values are mostly in the range of 2–18 × 10− 6 m/day, with an
average of 5.89 × 10− 6 m/day. These vertical hydraulic conductivity
values are smaller than the mean hydraulic conductivity value of 7.34 ×
10− 4 m/day reported by Thu and Fredlund (2000). The larger value in
the latter may result from larger horizontal conductivity required by the
simulation.
While Sskv and Kv are better interpreted by their overall range of
values due to covariance, Cv does not pose such concerns and hence each
value can be examined in detail. Our result shows that most Cv values are
within the range of 0.1– 0.66 m2/yr, with an average of 0.56 m2/yr.
Some wells yield very small or large Cv values, such as Q57 (0.07–0.1
m2/yr) or Q60 (2.63–2.99 m2/yr). In the case of Q57, we found that the
InSAR time-series only start from 2011 due to the lack of coverage in
ALOS data. The 4-yr shorter time-series makes the Cv estimation less
reliable. In the case of Q60, the subsidence rates were less than 4 mm/yr
throughout all three periods (Fig. 4), and the water head change rate is
also less than 0.1 m/yr. The low subsidence rate and low head change
rate suggest the area around Q60 has not experienced much compaction
yet possibly due to less pumping activities. The larger Cv is thus either
biased by the lack of significant head drop and ground subsidence, or by
the absence of aquitard compaction due to the probable hydraulic
window in this location (Hoang et al., 2017b). We also notice that
nonlinearity in the subsidence time-series may result in larger Cv un­
certainties (Fig. 7c & 7d), as seen in Q63, Q64, Q66 and Q68 (Fig. 8a).
This complication means more sophisticated stress-strain coupling
mechanism may be needed in order to model the subsidence time-series
over these sites.
The Cv values obtained in this study are in the same order of
magnitude as those obtained from laboratory tests conducted on aqui­
tard materials over different places, including Singapore (0.55 m2/yr),
9
Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555
Bangkok (0.22 m2/yr) and central California (0.33 m2/yr) (Yamada
et al., 2019). The aquitard in these places all have high clay content:
70% for Singapore, 77% for Bangkok and >90% (clay and silt) for
central California. As a comparison, the aquitard in Ho Chi Minh City
only has clay content of <50% (or <80% for clay and silt), and the Cv
values reaches >2 m2/yr (Thoang and Giao, 2015). This comparison
indicates that the fine-grained (clay and silt) content in Hanoi’s aquitard
may also reach >90%, and prolonged hydrodynamic lag is expected in
Hanoi upon any drawdown of groundwater (see the large τ values in
Table 5).
The value τ is an estimate of the time needed to complete the residual
compaction in the aquitard (Terzaghi et al., 1996). The average τ in
Hanoi is 395 years (Table 5), although some wells demonstrate values
up to 1–2 thousand years (such as Q62 and Q63). The thousand-year
scale may indicate different aquitard properties in the particular area
(see the discussion of Zone C in Section 5.1). Other than that area, most
places in Hanoi show τ values of hundred-year scales, suggesting that the
remnant subsidence may occur within a few centuries.
5. Discussion
5.1. Zoning of subsidence susceptibility in Hanoi
In this section we discuss the severity and controlling factors for the
land subsidence in different parts of Hanoi. To facilitate a better com­
parison, we calculate the total ground subsidence at pixels with solu­
tions from all three SAR periods (Fig. 8a), the predicted future
subsidence for near, mid and long terms based on 1D models (Fig. 8c and
Table 6), and the total groundwater storage changes by summing up the
long-term head changes in all head levels (Fig. 8d). Together with the
hydrogeological parameters derived from 1D models, we separate Hanoi
into different zones (Fig. 8a & 8d):
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

Fig. 8. (a) Cv values obtained in this study, underlain by the map of cumulative subsidence between 2007 and 2018. (b) Sskv and Kv values. (c) Predicted subsidence
in the future: 2030, 2050 and 2100 (see Table 6 for prediction values). (d) Total groundwater (GW) storage change in the aquifer systems (summation of all long-term
head changes including qh, qp2, qp1 and n) during the periods of 1997–2018 and 2007–2018. The tick range in each plot represents the minimum and maximum
values obtained during 1D modeling. Thick white dashed lines indicate the boundary for groundwater zoning discussed in Section 5.1.

Table 5
Inelastic specific skeletal storage (Sskv), vertical hydraulic conductivity (Kv), coefficient of consolidation (Cv) and the time constant (τ) estimated from the 1D coupled
diffusion model. See Fig. 4 for district names and well locations. Note that Cv is converted from m2/day to m2/yr.
District Well Sskv (x10− 3) m− 1
σSskv (x10− 3) m− 1
Kv (x10− 6) m/day σKv (x10− 6) m/day Cv (min-max) m2/yr τ (min-max) yr
Q57 6.8 1.1 1.8 0.1 0.1 (0.07–0.1) 662 (662–921)
Hoai Duc Q58 5.0 0.3 9.2 0.4 0.66 (0.54–0.66) 95 (95–117)
Q60 1.2 0.0 9.6 0.6 2.92 (2.63–2.99) 22 (21–24)
Q62 0.6 0.8 0.4 0.1 0.24 (0.04–0.24) 263 (263–1578)
Central Hanoi Q63 6.8 2.3 0.6 0.9 0.04 (0.04–2.19) 1987 (29–2163)
Q64 5.0 1.2 6.6 1.4 0.47 (0.22–0.88) 133 (72–270)
Hoang Mai Q65 6.2 1.5 3.0 0.1 0.17 (0.1–0.33) 347 (244–643)
Thanh Tri Q66 4.2 1.2 2.0 0.9 0.18 (0.15–1.2) 368 (53–487)
Q68 4.6 3.6 3.8 2.4 0.29 (0.07–1.2) 212 (54–797)
Ha Dong Q69 12.0 4.2 18.0 3.0 0.55 (0.22–0.55) 117 (117–292)
Q75 7.2 0.9 9.8 0.8 0.51 (0.33–0.51) 142 (135–215)
5.89 0.56 395
Mean (Median) 5.42 (5.00)
(3.80) (0.29) (212)

1) Zone A: Severe subsidence with major groundwater storage decrease.
The largest cumulative subsidence in Hanoi metropolitan occurs in
Ha Dong, up to 490 mm between 2007 and 2018. This area also
experiences substantial groundwater storage decrease, up to 25 m
between 1997 and 2018. This similarity means the large subsidence
in this district is mainly driven by large decrease of hydraulic heads.
The Cv value at the center of subsidence around Q69 is 0.55 m2/yr,
not different from the regional average of 0.56 m2/yr. The value in
Q68 (0.29 m2/yr) is lower than the average but it comes with a larger
uncertainty range of 0.07–1.2 m2/yr.
2) Zone B: Substantial subsidence with minor groundwater storage
decrease. In the southern part of Central Hanoi and Hoang Mai
(around Q64 & Q65), the total groundwater storage change is only
~9 m since 1997, yet this area experiences up to 350 mm subsidence
since 2007. The Cv values are also close to average, 0.17–0.47 m2/yr.
The same phenomenon can be observed in eastern Hoai Duc (Q58),
where 8-m groundwater storage change is accompanied by 200 mm
subsidence (for a subsidence pattern with better spatial coverage, see
Fig. 4). The Cv value is slightly higher, ~0.66 m2/yr. There are two
possible explanations for what happened to Zone B. One is that both
areas are experiencing hydrodynamic lag in which the current sub­
sidence is a consequence from the past hydraulic head drop. The
alternative explanation is that the head levels from monitoring wells
cannot reflect the actual hydraulic head changes in these areas, most
likely due to undocumented pumping.

10
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

3) Zone C: Minor subsidence with substantial groundwater storage
decrease. From central to northern part of Central Hanoi (around
Q63 & Q62), the water storage has seen a large decrease of ~21 m,
but the cumulative land subsidence is less than 50 mm. One possible
explanation is the smaller Cv (0.04 and 0.24 m2/yr for Q63 and Q62)
and hence different aquitard property in this area. In other words,
this region may be relatively more resistant to pumping-induced
ground subsidence compared to other parts of Hanoi.
4) Zone D: Minor subsidence with minor groundwater storage decrease.
This zone includes Thanh Tri and the western part of Hoai Duc. There
is probably not much pumping and hence little ground subsidence
yet.
Based on the proposed zoning, we suggest that pumping activities in
Zone A should be reduced in order to avoid further deterioration of
ground subsidence. With all pumping activities stopped immediately,
we still expect another 45 cm of subsidence in the next decade
(2019–2030) and 1.3–1.6 m of subsidence by the end of this century
(Fig. 8c and Table 6). For Zone B, efforts are needed to clarify the sit­
uation of undocumented pumping. We also expect another 7–15 cm of
subsidence in the next decade and a total settlement of 35–46 cm before
the year of 2100. Given the large prospective subsidence in Zone A and
Zone B, artificial recharging of groundwater may be needed in order to
reduce the magnitude or to slow down the subsidence trend. Zone C and
Zone D seem relatively safe for groundwater exploitation, although the
susceptibility to subsidence in Zone D requires continuous monitoring
upon development.
5.2. Sinking of major South East Asian cities in the early 21th century
In addition to the intra-city comparison within Hanoi, we would also
like to extend the discussion to other major South East Asian (SEA) cities
in order to assess the sinking problem from a regional perspective. To
this purpose, we aggregate information for six major cities, including
Bangkok (BK), Ho Chi Minh City (HCM), Hanoi (HN), Jakarta (JKT),
Manila (MNL) and Yangon (YG) (Fig. 9 & Table 7). Substantial subsi­
dence has been reported in these cities based on leveling, InSAR and/or
GNSS measurements. According to our findings in Hanoi, we understand
that subsidence can be localized in each city. To form the bases for
comparison, we select the following five indexes: maximum subsidence
rate, population density, mean pumping rate, maximum water level
change rate and the maximum coefficient of consolidation for aquitards
(Cv). Among all the literature we reviewed, we select the values for
comparison using two criteria: 1) we choose reports as close to the
present as possible, and 2) we choose reports with as much overlapping
time span among all five indexes as possible. The latter criterion is of
particular importance, because it ensures that for each individual city,
the discussion of numbers is self-consistent in terms of time.
Among these six cities, Jakarta has been known by its severe subsi­
dence issue during the past two decades (Abidin et al., 2011; Chaussard
et al., 2013; Kaneko and Toyota, 2011). It faces more than 22 cm/yr of
maximum subsidence (Abidin et al., 2011; Chaussard et al., 2013), about
45% more than the city that ranks second (Manila, ~15 cm/yr) (Rau­
coules et al., 2013). Yangon ranks the third, with maximum subsidence
rate of ~11 cm/yr (van der Horst et al., 2018). The other three cities,
Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, seem to experience relatively
mild subsidence, at rates of <7 cm/yr (Minh et al., 2015; Phien-wej
et al., 2006).
The level of severity in sinking seems best correlated with population
density. The two most affected cities, Jakarta and Manila, both have
population density over 10,000 people per square kilometer. This
extreme density has led to high water demand, part of which inevitably
from groundwater. Yet the correlation between subsidence rate and
pumping rate do not seem to be all that obvious. One possible expla­
nation is a large proportion of undocumented pumping. For example,
Abidin et al. (2011) and Chaussard et al. (2013) suggest that the actual
abstraction could be 1.5 to >2.2 times larger than what is in the official
records in Jakarta. In this study we also found the same issue of un­
documented pumping in Hanoi. The discrepancy between the official
and actual pumping volumes poses a big challenge to most SEA
countries.
Another relevant parameter is the maximum groundwater level
change rate. Similar to the mean pumping rate, there does not seem to be
significant water level decrease in Jakarta, Manila and Yangon
compared to the other three cities. Ho Chi Minh City actually has a larger
water level drop rate than Jakarta and Yangon. There are two possible
explanations. One is that this discrepancy again reflects the failure to
capture the actual hydraulic head changes due to insufficient density of
monitoring wells, which may also be the problem in some districts of
Hanoi. Another explanation is regarding where the groundwater level
changes take place with respect to the safe groundwater levels (Hung
et al., 2021). If the groundwater elevation has dropped below such
levels, any further drop will induce more irreversible compactions,
while changes above such levels may have relatively minor impacts.
From this regard, groundwater level change rate alone may not be suf­
ficient to explain the subsidence; knowing the sustaining groundwater
levels will be the key.
The most intriguing finding is that for the coefficient of consolidation
Cv, Jakarta ranks the top among all six cities – in contrast to the situation
in Hanoi. With a Cv value as large as 9.5 m2/yr (Kooi and Erkens, 2020),
compaction in Jakarta can happen quickly in response to any ground­
water withdrawal. On the contrary, Hanoi has a maximum Cv value of
only 0.66 m2/yr (this study), which means the aquitard responds to
groundwater drawdown at a pace one order of magnitude slower than
that in Jakarta. That is why Hanoi only suffers a maximum of ~50 cm
subsidence during the past 12 years, which can be achieved in Jakarta
within 2–3 years.
Similar to many parts of the world, these SEA cities share the concern
of climate change. Some of the severe subsidence rates increase the
cities’ vulnerability to floods and damage to manmade structures. Our
comparison shows that the level of severity in sinking is caused by the
combination of geotechnical conditions (aquitard Cv), social conditions
(population density) and the choices made thereof (pumping volume
and illegal pumping). The challenges faced by the government therefore

Table 6
Estimate of future subsidence in Hanoi, based on the assumption of no drastic changes in pumping and groundwater uses and similar climate conditions.
Zone Well Near term, 2019–2030 Mid-term, 2019–2050 Long term, 2019–2100

Best estimate (cm) Range of estimates (cm) Best estimate (cm) Range of estimates (cm) Best estimate (cm) Range of estimates (cm)

Q68 12.7 12.1–13.3 27.4 22.4–29.7 48.7 28.4–55.2

A
Q69 38.9 38.9–40.7 81.0 81.0–87.8 130.8 130–162
Q58 14.9 14.9–15.2 30.3 30.3–31.5 46.0 46.0–50.7
B Q64 10.6 9.7–11.1 23.1 19.2–24.7 39.0 26.9–46.8
Q65 7.9 7.5–8.2 18.0 17.1–18.8 34.9 31.4–36.7
Q62 1.3 1.3–1.5 2.9 2.9–3.4 5.3 5.3–6.6
C
Q63 3.3 1.6–3.6 7.5 2.4–8.0 14.5 2.6–15.2
Q66 3.2 2.3–3.3 7.0 4.4–7.3 13.2 5.6–13.8
D
Q75 5.4 5.4–5.5 11.6 11.6–12.1 19.4 19.4–21.9

11
M. Nguyen et al. Engineering Geology 299 (2022) 106555

Fig. 9. (Center) Total population in six major South East Asian cities and (side panels) the comparison of five sinking-related parameters (see details in Table 7). The
numbers on each bar represent the end year of each respective time span for the data.

vary from place to place. Comprehensive scientific investigation will be

Table 7
needed to obtain the best strategies for effective groundwater exploi­
Compilation of ground subsidence related parameters in major South East Asian
tation and subsidence mitigation in each city.
cities. The number in parenthesis is the time span within which the parameter
value is obtained. List of references for each city: Yangon (Khaing, 2016; van der
Horst et al., 2018; Yamada et al., 2019), Bangkok (Aobpaet et al., 2013; Babel 6. Conclusions
et al., 2010; Phien-wej et al., 2006), Jakarta (Abidin et al., 2011; Chaussard
et al., 2013; Kooi and Erkens, 2020), Manila (Clemente et al., 2001; NWRB, We use 12 years of InSAR time-series and 22 years of piezometric
2004; Raucoules et al., 2013), Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) (Minh et al., 2015; records to track the spatiotemporal evolution of land subsidence and
Thoang and Giao, 2015) and Hanoi (this study). groundwater depletion in Hanoi. Our result shows diminishing subsi­
City Max Population Mean Max Max Cv dence in central Hanoi, while the southern and western outskirts (Ha
subsidence density (103 pumping GWL (m2/ Dong and Hoai Duc district) become the new subsidence center during
rate (cm/yr) per km2) rate (106 change yr)
the past few years. The maximum subsidence rate reaches up to 50 mm/
m3/d) (m/yr)
yr, and the maximum cumulative subsidence can be as high as 500 mm.
Bangkok 2.4 (‘79-‘98) 1.3 (‘08) 0.5 (‘06) 0.9 (‘81- 2–3
The maximum groundwater storage decrease is ~23 m over 22 years.
3.0 (‘05-‘10) 1.8 (‘04) ‘97)
HCMC 7.0 (‘06-‘10) 3.7 (‘11) 0.7 (‘08) 2.0 (‘00- 1.89–5
The coefficient of consolidation obtained through 1D modeling has an
‘06) average of 0.56 m2/yr, suggesting the aquitard is composed of mainly
Hanoi 4.0 (‘11-‘15) 2.2 (‘15) 0.78 (‘16) 1.2 (‘11- 0.66 clay and silt materials, possibly up to 90%. Based on the data integra­
‘15) tion, we delineate zones for subsidence susceptibility and groundwater
Jakarta 12.3 (‘01- 14.5 (‘10) 0.9 (‘07) 1.9 (‘02- 9.5
management in Hanoi. One interesting discovery of this study is that the
‘02) ‘07)
21.8 (‘07- subsidence issue in Hanoi is relatively mild compared to other South
‘09) East Asian cities. This resistance to subsidence may result from smaller
Manila 15.0 (‘93- 18 (‘10) 1.1 (‘04) 2.3 (‘93- N/A coefficient of consolidation, and most important of all, a lighter popu­
‘10) ‘10)
lation pressure and hence a smaller demand for groundwater.
Yangon 11.0 (‘15- 5.5 (‘18) 0.4 (‘13) 1.8 (‘15- 1.8
‘17) ‘17)
Our study demonstrates that when ground-based continuous mea­
surements are not available, subsidence time-series by concatenating
data from different SAR missions can be as accurate and useful in
determining the hydrogeological properties of the basin. Especially

12
M. Nguyen et al.
when dealing with the hydrodynamic lag phenomenon, the longer the
deformation records, the more precise the prediction for future subsi­
dence. The challenge of producing a long InSAR deformation time-series
though lies in the need to accommodate different data characteristics
from each mission in order to maximize the detection accuracy and
spatial coverage at the same time. This study sets an example for the
tuning of processing techniques to achieve our ultimate scientific goal.
Funding
This study is funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology
(MOST-109-2119-M-001-011) and Academia Sinica (AS-TP-108-M08-1)
in Taiwan for MN and YNL, and the Vietnam Ministry of Science and
Technolgy (DTDL.2012-T/28) for QCT.
Data availability
The ALOS stripmap data is purchased from JAXA through AUIG2.
The CSK stripmap data is purchased from e-GEOS. The Sentinel-1 data is
processed by ESA and retrieved from ASF DAAC. The MLCM well data is
managed by IGS, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Viet­
nam. The head levels from monitoring wells are managed by NAWAPI.
Campaign-mode GNSS data and leveling data are managed by IGS,
Vietnam Institute of Geodesy and Cartography and Department of
Construction, Hanoi City Government. Continuous GNSS data is
managed by Nevada Geodetic Laboratory.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare no conflict of interests.
Acknowledgement
We would like to thank Dr. Wei-Chia Hung in Green Environment
Engineering Consultant Co. LTD for his valuable suggestions during the
course of this study. We also thank both anonymous reviewers and the
editor for their constructive comments that improve the quality of this
paper. This work is IESAS paper number 2403.
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