Український гідрометеорологічний журнал (Dec 2021)
Water quality assessment of the rivers of the Southern Buh Basin within Vinnytsia Region as per integral indicator of pollution
Abstract
Vinnytsia Region is a region of Ukraine that attracts people by its nature from ancient times to the present day and is subject to various active economic development efforts. Natural water (aquatic) objects such rivers, lakes, as well as their floodplains and watersheds, are among the ones that are intensively affected by human activities. Therefore, the author chose the basin of the Southern Buh River within Vinnytsia Region for establishing a degree of anthropogenic transformation in the river itself and for determining the state of its left tributaries. The paper highlights the results of field and laboratory studies of chemical and organoleptic state of water of the Southern Buh and its tributaries. The study of the Southern Buh Basin was conducted within Vinnytsia Region, as it is a region of early agricultural development and it has a large number of enterprises of various industries on its territory. Since the basin occupies a large area of Vinnytsia Region, it was reasonable to explore the main tributaries of the Southern Buh flowing through the main localities, and to identify the required sampling points. Currently, the problem of ensuring rational use of water resources is severe because of such factors as growth of water consumption, irrational use of natural resources, excessive and uncontrolled economic activity. All these factors lead to disruption of relations within geosystems, degradation of natural components and decrease of natural resources productivity. Therefore, the study of a degree of anthropogenic transformation of landscape complexes, including geosystems, allows identification of a possibility to reverse anthropogenic changes and display intensity and tendencies of natural processes after transformation of the complexes, as well as display of ability of natural components of the landscape to self-restore. All these components are necessary for field researches and form a basis for the author's research. The aim of the research is to conduct an assessment of the ecological status of surface waters, which serves as one of components of the general status of water bodies, as well as to determine their chemical status based on concentrations of high-priority hazardous pollutants. It establishes the fact that the quality of surface waters of the basin depends on a degree of pollution of water bodies that are subject to economic activity affecting the transformation of the basin system.
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