Shallow geophysical and hydrological investigations to identify groundwater contamination in Wadi Bani Malik dam area Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

The integration of geophysical techniques with hydrological investigation is frequently used for solving different geological and environmental problems including groundwater quality and exploration and seismic vulnerability assessment. In this research, the shallow geophysical techniques comprising of electrical resistivity profiling, vertical electrical sounding, and ground magnetic were used to identify the contaminated areas lying in the upstream and downstream of Almisk Lake in Jeddah. The chemical analyses of water samples collected from the wells located in the downstream and upstream areas were used to support these results as an increase in the total dissolved solids (TDS) shows a decrease in the resistivity value. The results of geophysical techniques and hydrochemical analyses show that the TDS values are significantly higher in the upstream area of dam than those of the downstream, which suggests that the contaminating source is lying in the upstream of the reservoir. Moreover, the dam was not completely successful to block the contamination because of improper base. The hydrochemical analysis and geophysical results clearly indicate that the groundwater is not suitable for drinking and irrigation purposes.

Keywords

• groundwater contamination
• hydrogeophysics
• hydrochemical analyses
• total dissolved solids