Water Quality Assessment of the Morava e Binçës River Based on the Physicochemical Parameters and Water Quality Index

Abstract

The quality of surface waters is being impacted by the anthropogenic and natural pollution, thus limiting the usage of this water for drinking, industry, agriculture, recreation and other purposes. The water quality indices are intended to provide a single value for the water quality of a source or a stream that reduces the large amount of parameters in a simpler expression and enables an easy interpretation of the monitoring data. During 2017, seventeen physicochemical parameters were measured in spring, summer, autumn and winter, in five locations along the Morava e Binçës River in Kosovo. For the assessment we employed the Water Quality Index (WQI) which uses the physicochemical parameters for the evaluation of the water quality. The findings of this study ascertain that MB1 station had the best quality with a value of WQI 88 and is classified in the Good Category, whereas the lowest quality of water was found on in MB4 station with a value of WQI 65 and it is thus classified in the Fair Category. Finally, the average WQI was calculated for the entire measurement period and it resulted in a value of 77.60 indicating that the Morava e Binçës River waters belong to the Fair Category.

Keywords

• physicochemical parametres
• river waters
• water quality
• WQI
• Morava e Binçës