Applied Water Science (Jun 2018)
Spatial analysis of groundwater quality mapping in hard rock area in the Akola and Buldhana districts of Maharashtra, India
Abstract
Abstract The study of groundwater quality parameters is most essential for irrigation and drinking water, and its quality is a serious problem around the study area. The spatial analysis of groundwater quality mapping is required and stimulated us to undertake a systematic work of groundwater quality parameters for suitable water exploration of crops and drinking purposes from bore wells and open wells in basaltic hard rock area. A detailed study of physico-chemical parameters composition of groundwater was performed from groundwater quality data of post-monsoon (December) in the year of 2013. The groundwater quality data were collected from 35 wells samples randomly distributed in area. GIS is a powerful tool for representation and analysis of spatial information related to groundwater resources management. To achieve this aim, the groundwater quality samples were analysed for the preparation of groundwater quality maps such as pH, electrical conductivity, TDS, Cl and Mg. The groundwater quality parameters were analysed for all the sampling locations using IWD interpolation techniques. In this study, groundwater quality values observed are minimum and maximum values of pH (6.2–8 on scale), electrical conductivity (348–1598 S/cm), total dissolved solids (268.32–707.95 mg/l), carbonate (0–30 mg/l), bicarbonate (0.9–58.9 mg/l), chloride (1.15–28.36 mg/l), sulphate (17.4–105 mg/l), nitrate (0.4–6.0 mg/l), calcium (2.35–7.24 mg/l), magnesium (2.88–3.73 mg/l), sodium (0.57–3.31 mg/l), potassium (0.26–1.2 mg/l), sulphate (0.5–4.64 mg/l), bicarbonate+ carbonate (1.07–11.16 mg/l) and carbonate (0–0.79 mg/l) in hard rock area. The spatial variation maps were derived and integrated through ARC GIS 10.3 software. The interpolation tool was used to obtain the spatial distribution of groundwater quality parameters in the basaltic hard rock area. Therefore, the result of groundwater analysis of large number of groundwater samples has been found to be suitable for drinking and irrigation purposes in the basaltic hard rock area.
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