scholarly journals Meteorological Variability and Groundwater Quality: Examples in Different Hydrogeological Settings

Water ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 1297 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuela Lasagna ◽  
Daniela Ducci ◽  
Mariangela Sellerino ◽  
Susanna Mancini ◽  
Domenico Antonio De Luca
Keyword(s):  
Groundwater Quality ◽  
Chemical Species ◽  
Test Site ◽  
Temperature Variability ◽  
Nitrate Contamination ◽  
Anthropogenic Contamination ◽  
Piedmont Plain ◽  
Unconfined Aquifers ◽  
Campanian Plain ◽  
Over Time

Rainfall and temperature variability causes changes in groundwater recharge that can also influence groundwater quality by different processes. The aim of this study is the analysis of the hydrogeochemical variations over time due to meteorological variability in two different study areas in Italy: an alluvial aquifer in the Piedmont Po plain and an alluvial-pyroclastic aquifer in the Campanian plain. The examined plains show groundwater with natural quality not satisfying the European drinking water standards, or anthropogenic contamination. The peculiar natural quality is due, in the Campanian plain, to the closeness of volcanic areas, and to the presence of reducing conditions. In Piedmont plain a test site is characterized by a point-source contamination by heavy metals, due to the presence of past industrial activities. In all the examined areas there is a diffuse nitrate contamination. The fluctuations of the ions As, F, Fe, Mn, Cr VI, NO3, and Cl were analyzed and compared, using statistical methods, with the variations over time in precipitation, temperature, and piezometric levels, sometimes significant. Results highlight the importance of the groundwater and meteorological monitoring and the key role of the recharge variation in the hydrogeochemical processes. The linking degree between rainfall/temperature variability and hydrogeochemistry is variable, in function of the typology of chemical species, their origin, and of the aquifer characteristics. The fluctuation of climate variables determines sudden changes in the geochemistry of shallow unconfined aquifers (e.g., in the Piedmont plain), while semiconfined or confined aquifers (e.g., in the Volturno-Regi Lagni plain) react with a greater delay to these variations. Moreover, natural quality is more affected by climatic variations than anthropogenic contamination, which is the result of multiple environmental and anthropic factors.

Chemical variations in time in a context of climate variability: examples in different hydrogeological settings

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuela Lasagna ◽  
Daniela Ducci ◽  
Mariangela Sellerino ◽  
Susanna Mancini ◽  
Domenico De Luca
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Variability ◽  
Groundwater Quality ◽  
Unsaturated Zone ◽  
Nitrate Contamination ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Piezometric Level ◽  
Po Plain ◽  
Campanian Plain

<p>Increased variability in precipitation and more extreme weather events caused by climate change can lead to more extended periods of droughts and floods, which directly affects the availability of groundwater. The consequent fluctuation of the water table can also affect groundwater quality. Particularly, a higher recharge, and the resultant increase of the piezometric level, can have, as a positive result, the dilution of the contaminants in aquifers and a decrease of the concentrations. On the other side, water that infiltrates can leach pollutants that are present in the unsaturated zone, with an increase of groundwater pollution. Even, the rise of the piezometric level can have negative consequences on groundwater quality, also due to groundwater that leach the capillary fringe and the previously unsaturated zone; if a contaminant is present in these sectors, it can lead to an increase of the aquifer pollution.</p><p>The increase or decrease in contaminants levels depend on a complex balance between all the described phenomena, and contaminant behaviour. This study wants to analyse the hydrogeochemical variations in time due to climate variability to define the role of different processes.</p><p>Two different hydrogeological environments were chosen as test fields: an alluvial aquifer in the Piedmont Po Plain (NW Italy) and an alluvial-pyroclastic aquifer in the Campanian plain (S Italy).</p><p>Piedmont Po plain shows a diffuse nitrate contamination, due to intensive agricultural and livestock activities. A nickel contamination is locally present, due to natural causes, namely the presence of basic and ultrabasic rocks debris in the supply basins, containing high amount of nickel-bearing femic minerals. Consequently, nitrate and nickel fluctuation were analysed and compared with precipitation and piezometric levels.</p><p>The hydrogeochemistry of the Campanian plain is influenced by the closeness of volcanic active areas (Phlegrean Fields and Vesuvius), bringing high As and F values, and by the presence of reducing conditions, bringing high Fe and Mn values. Moreover, there is a widespread nitrate contamination, prevalently due to intensive agricultural and livestock activities. The fluctuations of these 5 ions (As, F, Fe, Mn and NO<sub>3</sub>) have been observed during almost twenty years and compared with the differences in recharge, sometimes significant due to the climate change.</p><p>The monitoring and analyses of the chemical concentrations of ions of anthropogenic and natural origin in a context of climate variability represent a key element to offer a new and different research perspective in the field of groundwater chemistry.</p>

scholarly journals Groundwater quality assessment using water quality index (WQI) under GIS framework

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Arjun Ram ◽  
S. K. Tiwari ◽  
H. K. Pandey ◽  
Abhishek Kumar Chaurasia ◽  
Supriya Singh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Groundwater Quality ◽  
Water Quality Index ◽  
Quality Index ◽  
Uttar Pradesh ◽  
Granite Gneiss ◽  
Total Hardness ◽  
Human Consumption ◽  
Anthropogenic Contamination ◽  
Quality Of Water

AbstractGroundwater is an important source for drinking water supply in hard rock terrain of Bundelkhand massif particularly in District Mahoba, Uttar Pradesh, India. An attempt has been made in this work to understand the suitability of groundwater for human consumption. The parameters like pH, electrical conductivity, total dissolved solids, alkalinity, total hardness, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, bicarbonate, sulfate, chloride, fluoride, nitrate, copper, manganese, silver, zinc, iron and nickel were analysed to estimate the groundwater quality. The water quality index (WQI) has been applied to categorize the water quality viz: excellent, good, poor, etc. which is quite useful to infer the quality of water to the people and policy makers in the concerned area. The WQI in the study area ranges from 4.75 to 115.93. The overall WQI in the study area indicates that the groundwater is safe and potable except few localized pockets in Charkhari and Jaitpur Blocks. The Hill-Piper Trilinear diagram reveals that the groundwater of the study area falls under Na+-Cl−, mixed Ca2+-Mg2+-Cl− and Ca2+-$${\text{HCO}}_{3}^{ - }$$ HCO 3 - types. The granite-gneiss contains orthoclase feldspar and biotite minerals which after weathering yields bicarbonate and chloride rich groundwater. The correlation matrix has been created and analysed to observe their significant impetus on the assessment of groundwater quality. The current study suggests that the groundwater of the area under deteriorated water quality needs treatment before consumption and also to be protected from the perils of geogenic/anthropogenic contamination.

Nitrate in aquifers beneath agricultural systems

2002 ◽  
Vol 45 (9) ◽  
pp. 19-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
M.R. Burkart ◽  
J.D. Stoner
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Groundwater Vulnerability ◽  
The United States ◽  
Point Sources ◽  
Nitrate Contamination ◽  
Agricultural System ◽  
Agricultural Systems ◽  
Fertilizer Use ◽  
Unconfined Aquifers ◽  
The World

Research from several regions of the world provides spatially anecdotal evidence to hypothesize which hydrologic and agricultural factors contribute to groundwater vulnerability to nitrate contamination. Analysis of nationally consistent measurements from the U.S. Geological Survey’s NAWQA program confirms these hypotheses for a substantial range of agricultural systems. Shallow unconfined aquifers are most susceptible to nitrate contamination associated with agricultural systems. Alluvial and other unconsolidated aquifers are the most vulnerable and shallow carbonate aquifers provide a substantial but smaller contamination risk. Where any of these aquifers are overlain by permeable soils the risk of contamination is larger. Irrigated systems can compound this vulnerability by increasing leaching facilitated by additional recharge and additional nutrient applications. The agricultural system of corn, soybeans, and hogs produced significantly larger concentrations of groundwater nitrate than all other agricultural systems, although mean nitrate concentrations in counties with dairy, poultry, cattle and grains, and horticulture systems were similar. If trends in the relation between increased fertilizer use and groundwater nitrate in the United States are repeated in other regions of the world, Asia may experience increasing problems because of recent increases in fertilizer use. Groundwater monitoring in Western and Eastern Europe as well as Russia over the next decade may provide data to determine if the trend in increased nitrate contamination can be reversed. If the concentrated livestock trend in the United States is global, it may be accompanied by increasing nitrogen contamination in groundwater. Concentrated livestock provide both point sources in the confinement area and intense non-point sources as fields close to facilities are used for manure disposal. Regions where irrigated cropland is expanding, such as in Asia, may experience the greatest impact of this practice.

Risk and Vulnerability on the Campanian Plain: The Vesuvius Eruption of A.D. 472

2020 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-37
Author(s):  
Cam Grey
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
Power Relationships ◽  
Textual Evidence ◽  
Disaster Studies ◽  
Campanian Plain ◽  
Vesuvius Volcano ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Over Time

The projects of social history, disaster studies, and archaeology deliberately tend to eschew consideration of events, focusing instead on processes and structures that unfold gradually over time. The eruption of the Somma-Vesuvius volcano in Campania, Italy, in 472 presents tangible markers of a specific moment, although the absence of local textual evidence and the strong hints of rapid re-exploitation of the rich and fertile soils of the region suggest that the scale of the disaster that it precipitated was limited. A perspective on the eruption informed by the concepts of risk and vulnerability demonstrates that the population of the Campanian Plain had different experiences of the eruption according to factors such as their location, the nature and robustness of their social and economic resources, and their mechanisms for accessing and exploiting power relationships.

Sewage static system influence on the concentrations of nitrogen compounds in unconfined aquifers

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Filipe da Silva Peixoto ◽  
Itabaraci Nazareno Cavalcante
Keyword(s):  
Groundwater Quality ◽  
Total Dissolved Solids ◽  
Oxidation Potential ◽  
Nitrogen Compounds ◽  
Static System ◽  
Nitrogenous Compounds ◽  
Septic Tanks ◽  
Unconfined Aquifers ◽  
High Oxidation ◽  
Using Data

ABSTRACT This research aimed to investigate the relation between sanitary situation and groundwater quality, using the concentration of nitrogenous compounds. The aquifer studied is unconfined and situated in the periurban zone of Fortaleza (NE Brazil). Through the Geographic Information System (GIS), a relational database was created using data from the IBGE demographic census (2011), to analyze numbers of households linked to septic tanks or rudimentary cesspit. The groundwater quality was evaluated based on nitrogen compounds (N-NH3 +; NO2 -; N-NO3 -), pH, and total dissolved solids (TDS). The highest concentrations of nitrates are found in areas with a higher density of septic tanks and rudimentary cesspit. Furthermore, nitrate was more present in water table above 6.6 m, mainly in the interfluvial zones, which have a high oxidation potential. The results contribute to the loss of contamination, based on the number of households with septic tanks and rudimentary cesspit, in unconfined aquifers, which were more vulnerable to contamination, mainly in peripheric expansions areas in the cities, where the deficit in sewage services tends to be high.

Use of carbon-14 and tritium to investigate flow and storage of water in the Christchurch groundwater system

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Stewart ◽  
Rob van der Raaij
Keyword(s):  
Nitrate Contamination ◽  
Water Age ◽  
The West ◽  
Groundwater System ◽  
Carbon 14 ◽  
Water Flows ◽  
Long Term Study ◽  
Age Range ◽  
Binary Mixing ◽  
Over Time

<p><span lang="EN-US">Combined <sup>14</sup>C and <sup>3</sup>H measurements on groundwater from Christchurch, New Zealand, are proving vitally important for revealing water age distributions, which are key to understanding the diverse flows in the system (including younger potentially polluting water flows from near the surface and much older pristine water flows from depth). The deep gravel aquifers 350-500m thick under Christchurch have been studied since 1970 using <sup>14</sup>C along with <sup>3</sup>H, <sup>18</sup>O and chemical concentrations to characterize the residence times, sources and flowpaths of the water. Of note in this long-term study is the successful use of <sup>14</sup>C to determine mean ages of groundwater in the age range from 5 years to 2000 years, which is made possible by the absence of carbonate in the aquifer rocks and the presence of bomb <sup>14</sup>C in some samples (Stewart, 2012). The <sup>14</sup>C mean ages are showing that the groundwater system has changed markedly over time because of exploitation of the system, from young ages (60-70 years) across the system in 1976 to much older ages (i.e. 400 years on the west and 1600 years on the east) in 2017. Increasing amounts of deep stored water are being tapped by the wells, especially on the east (coastal) side. </span></p> <p><span lang="EN-US">Wells on the west side of the system have moderate <sup>14</sup>C mean ages (400-600 years) and some of the samples have <sup>3</sup>H showing that they also contain fractions of young water. Using binary mixing models allows the proportions and mean ages of the young fractions to be estimated. The mean ages of the young fractions have become younger over time, showing that nitrate contamination is becoming more likely. On the other hand, the fraction of older water is becoming larger and therefore more able to dilute the young fraction. Wells on the east side have much older <sup>14</sup>C ages (1600 years) and are <sup>3</sup>H-free showing that there are no such younger contributions. The results are providing valuable information for improved understanding and better management of the resource.</span></p>

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