Vulnerability Assessment of Groundwater Impacted by Wastewater Receiving Ponds: A Case Study in Roorkee, Northern India
Publication: Journal of Hazardous, Toxic, and Radioactive Waste
Volume 27, Issue 4
Abstract
Groundwater is an important drinking water source increasingly threatened by reduced groundwater recharge and direct or indirect contamination. Aquifers recharged by surface water bodies can get contaminated through seepage from already impacted surface water bodies. In the present study, various models were used to assess the vulnerability of groundwater intended for public use to contamination by local wastewater-receiving ponds (WRPs). The water quality parameters and water quality index (WQI) were analyzed for two WRPs (Sites A and B) and hand pumps located in their vicinity. Fourteen water quality parameters were measured for both the groundwater and WRPs and compared with the vulnerability models for the two WRPs. Four vulnerability models—GOD, DRASTIC, ASSIGN, and LeGrand models that used the land-use characteristics, depth to groundwater, soil type, slope, and precipitation data—were employed. The results of the vulnerability assessment agreed with the WQI (p-value < 0.05) for the LeGrand model. The performance of GOD, DRASTIC, and ASSIGN models was disappointing. The water quality was unsuitable for human use in both the WRPs and the groundwater sampled from their vicinity. The WQI ranged from 49 to 62, indicating poor-to-medium water quality for both groundwater aquifers. The results of LeGrand’s model confirmed that Sites A and B were vulnerable to water quality deterioration because of surface water contamination. There was a significant negative correlation between WQI and LeGrand’s vulnerability index for Site A (p-value = 0.0145, r = −0.682) (Pearson’s correlation) and Site B (p-value = 0.0013, r = −0.813) (Pearson’s correlation). It better suits to represent transient conditions of the groundwater, that is, varying groundwater levels and water table gradients.
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank Waibhaw Kumar for assistance with sampling and photographs and Anil Kumar for helping with water quality analyses. This research was supported by the Faculty Initiation Grant of the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (FIG/100762). The authors express their gratitude to the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB), Dehradun, for providing the required data to carry out the study for the Roorkee, Haridwar region, Uttarakhand, India.
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Journal of Hazardous, Toxic, and Radioactive Waste
Volume 27 • Issue 4 • October 2023
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© 2023 American Society of Civil Engineers.
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Received: Nov 16, 2022
Accepted: Mar 10, 2023
Published online: May 24, 2023
Published in print: Oct 1, 2023
Discussion open until: Oct 24, 2023
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