Thermal use of the shallow subsurface and its aquifers (< 400 m) is steadily increasing. Currently, more than 2800 aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES) systems are operating worldwide alongside more than 1.2 million ground source heat pump (GSHP) systems in Europe alone. These rising numbers of shallow geothermal energy (SGE) systems will put additional pressure on typically vulnerable groundwater systems. Hitherto, suitable criteria to control the thermal use of groundwater in national and international legislations are often still at a preliminary state or even non-existing. While the European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD) defined the release of heat into the groundwater as pollution in the year 2000, the cooling of groundwater for heating purposes is not explicitly mentioned yet. In contrast, some national legislations have stricter guidelines. For example, in Germany, detrimental changes in physical, chemical and biological characteristics have to be avoided. In the Swiss water ordinance, it is even recommended that the groundwater biocenosis should be kept in natural state. However, exact definitions of ‘detrimental changes’ and ‘natural state’ are still missing. Hence, the current study provides an overview on natural and affected thermal groundwater conditions and international and national legislations of the thermal use of groundwater. Also, it presents recent studies on groundwater ecosystems and proposes a sustainable policy framework for the thermal use of groundwater. In addition to geothermal heat sources, other anthropogenic heat sources such as climate change, underground car parks, heated basements, district heating systems, land fills, wastewater treatment plants and mining are considered, although no legislation on these anthropogenic heat sources and their impact on groundwater is currently in place. Finally, we intend to answer the above question and provide recommendations for the further discussions on the joint use of shallow groundwater systems for drinking water production and thermal use.

浅层地下及其含水层（< 400 m）的热利用正在稳步增加。目前，仅在欧洲就有超过 120 万个地源热泵 (GSHP) 系统在全球范围内运行 2800 多个蓄水层热能存储 (ATES) 系统。这些不断增加的浅层地热能 (SGE) 系统将给通常脆弱的地下水系统带来额外的压力。迄今为止，国家和国际立法中控制地下水热利用的适当标准通常仍处于初步状态，甚至不存在。虽然欧盟 (EU) 水框架指令 (WFD) 在 2000 年将热量释放到地下水中定义为污染，但尚未明确提及为加热目的而冷却地下水。相比之下，一些国家立法有更严格的指导方针。例如，在德国，必须避免物理、化学和生物特性的有害变化。在瑞士的水条例中，甚至建议地下水生物群落应保持在自然状态。然而，“有害变化”和“自然状态”的确切定义仍然缺失。因此，目前的研究概述了自然和受影响的热地下水条件以及地下水热利用的国际和国家立法。此外，它还介绍了最近对地下水生态系统的研究，并提出了地下水热利用的可持续政策框架。除地热热源外，其他人为热源，如气候变化、地下停车场、加热的地下室、考虑了区域供热系统、填埋场、污水处理厂和采矿，但目前还没有关于这些人为热源及其对地下水影响的立法。最后，我们打算回答上述问题，并为进一步讨论浅层地下水系统用于饮用水生产和热能利用的进一步讨论提供建议。