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The present study was carried out in the central part of the Azraq Basin of Jordan to delineate the various groundwater potential zones within this region. This study includes eight criteria; land use, soil, slope, rainfall, elevation, lithology , lineament density and drainage density. Data and information regarding these criteria were collated and ascertained through the employment and utilisation of satellite imagery and digital mapping. The weighted linear combination (WLC) technique was then employed to integrate these criteria within the GIS so that the area concerned could be evaluated regarding its various hydrogeomorphic characteristics. A review of the literature was then used to assess each of the criteria. Subsequently the criteria were assigned to various parameters per their significance and rating regarding groundwater potentiality. The delineated groundwater potential map was classified into four distinct zones, namely, low, moderate, high, and very high potential zones. From the study findings it can be seen that approximately17% of the area concerned in this study was shown to have very high groundwater potential, while 2.181% has a low potential and 32.612%is categorised as having high groundwater potential; the largest region was that of moderate groundwater potential, with 48.207% of the land being categorised as such. Furthermore, the groundwater potential zones map was verified against a map of existing wells to calculate the percentage of wells in each potential zone. The results showed that approximately 2% of the existing wells were within low potential zones, 66% were within moderate potential zones, 15% were within high potential zones, and only 17% were within very high potential zones.

In this study, an attempt was made to develop a new simplified groundwater vulnerability to contamination index (SGVI). Nine experts in the fields of groundwater, surface water, soil, landuse and GIS were interviewed to develop the new index. They were asked to agree on new parameters that could be used to investigate groundwater vulnerability. Data about such parameters must be affordable and inexpensive. Subsurface parameters were excluded due to the fact that most researchers might not have adequate data about them. The experts agreed that depth to groundwater, soil texture, lineament density, rainfall, topographic slope, drainage density and landuse/land cover parameters should be included in the new vulnerability index. The experts were also asked to give a weight and the ratings for each parameter. The weights given by the experts were subjected to AHP analysis to determine the exact weight for each parameter. An area of 3200 km2 in the northern part of Jordan was selected to test the SGVI. The final map of the SGVI showed that most of the area (more than 96%) had moderate-low and moderate-high vulnerability to contamination. The new index was also subjected to statistical analysis, map removal test and map removal sensitivity analysis. The outcomes of these analyses showed that the new index was applicable and could be used in areas where subsurface data was limited or not available.

This research is an attempt to develop a new GIS index to investigate the surface water susceptibility to pollution (SWSi). In this index, the Weighted Linear Combination techniques within GIS environment was used to calculate the overall surface water susceptibility to pollution scores based on using 6 factors. The model includes 3 natural factors: gradient slope, distance to surface water and soil. Also, it includes 3 man-made activities: urban, agriculture and roads. Each factor was given the appropriate weight and ratings and then the final index was calculated using GIS techniques. The final results showed that the study area (1235 km2) could be classified into low susceptibility with an area of 250 km2 (20.2%), moderate susceptibility with an area of 815.5 km2 (66%), high susceptibility with an area of 166.2 km2 (13.5%) and very high susceptibility with an area of 3.3 km2 (0.3%).

Za’atari camp is the largest refugee camp in Jordan. It was first established in 2012 to host Syrian refugees. Currently the camp hosts more than 81,000 refugees, with no proper sanitary system which might pose a major threat to surface resources in the area. An investigation was done at Za’atari refugees’ camp to find the impact of refugees settling on surface and groundwater quality. Surface water quality of surface runoff generated from thirty rain fall events were collected during the winter season of 2013/2014 from the major Wadi that passes through the camp and small ponds within the camp after the rainfall event. The collected samples were analyzed for acidity (pH), the electrical connectivity (EC), total dissolved solids (TDS), nutrients (NO3- and PO43-) and selected heavy metals (Mn, Cd, Zn, Pb and Ni) in addition to biological oxygen demand (BOD5), chemical oxygen demand (COD) and intestinal worms (Total Coliform, E. cali). The results showed that there are significant variations in the EC as well as with TDS between the sites due to fluctuating amounts of water used for different activities within the camp as it was highest in the center of the camp where most of the refugees settle decreasing away from the center. The pH values were within the specifications of the World Health Organization and the Jordanian Standards. For nutrients, nitrate concentration was low with high phosphate ions which are most probably from detergents origin.

Groundwater is considered to be the major water resource for many areas and the only source of water in some areas in Jordan. Some of Jordan groundwater resources are presently exploited at maximum capacity and in some cases are exploited beyond there safe yield. One of the efficient ways to fight the deficit in groundwater resources is through recharging the water tables naturally or artificially. This research aimed to select the optimum sites for groundwater recharge in the Azraq Oasis area/Jordan through the use of GIS techniques. The selection criteria were based on slope, drainage density, lineament density within the study area. The adopted selection technique was the Boolean techniques (Multiplication) within a Raster GIS. Thirty five sites were selected within the study area with areas vary between 5.2 ha to 273.5 ha. The total area that has the potential for groundwater recharge is 1659.5 ha which represents ca. 3.55% of the study area.

Jordan is located in an arid to semi arid region where around 90% of its land receives an average annual precipitation of less than 100 mm while only 3% of the land receives an average annual precipitation of 300 mm or more. Jordan is characterised as a “water scarce” country because the current per capita share of water is estimated to be of the order of 140 m3 per year which is well below the 1000 m3 threshold. Rainwater harvesting is the accumulating and storing, of rainwater. It has been used to provide drinking water, water for livestock, water for irrigation or to refill aquifers as a groundwater recharge. GIS has been widely used in selecting the best sites for water harvesting schemes. This research aims at selecting optimum sites for water harvesting schemes in the Jordan arid lands (Badia) using indigenous knowledge and geo-informatics. To achieve this aim, a community-based research and desktop investigating is applied. The community-based research focused on consulting with 200 stakeholders form local communities where they provided knowledge on opportunities and constrains form their experience on water management in the arid lands where they live and interact. Also they provided information on potential location for water collecting sites that has been used for ages to provide water to humans and livestock. On the other hand, desktop research is conducted on sitting criteria for water harvesting based on physical and socio-economic characteristics. The physical criteria include rainfall volumes, slope, distance to water courses (wadis), distance form geologic faults and soil texture, where socio-economic criteria include distance to groundwater wells, distance to urban area, distance to agriculture activities and distance to international brooders. This selecting criterion in combination with indigenous knowledge is used within GIS environment to identify optimum sites for water harvesting. GIS analysis resulted in identifying 118 potential sites. Of those, 30 sites had already recommended by the community consultations.

Jordan is characterised as a ‘water scarce’ country. It is considered as one of the lowest countries in the world on a per capita basis. The available water resources per capita are falling as a result of population growth and are projected to fall from less than 160 m3 per capita per year at present to about 90 m3 per capita per year by 2025. Water harvesting has been practiced in Jordan for thousands of years. There are indications of early water harvesting structures believed to have been constructed over 9000 years ago. There is a need to establish water harvesting projects at various places in Jordan to collect more surface water for domestic, agricultural and livestock watering usages. The selection of best sites for water harvesting schemes must be based on certain criteria that take into consideration the socio-economic and the physical characteristics of the targeted area. This research aimed to use both the Weighted Linear Combination and the Boolean techniques within GIS environment to select suitable areas in Northern Jordan for establishing water harvesting ponds. This resulted in having ca. 25% of the study area (64,184.8 ha) with high potential for constructing water harvesting ponds.

Water consumption in Jordan already exceeds renewable freshwater resources by more than 20% and, after the year 2005, freshwater resources are likely to be fully utilised. Over 50% of supply derives from groundwater and this paper focuses on a small part of the northern Badia region of Jordan that is underlain by the Azraq groundwater basin where it has been estimated that annual abstraction stands at over 100% of the projected safe yield. While water supply is a crucial issue, there is also evidence to suggest that the quality of groundwater supplies is also under threat as a result of salinisation and an increase in the use of agrochemicals. Focusing on this area, this paper attempts to produce groundwater vulnerability and risk maps. These maps are designed to show areas of greatest potential for groundwater contamination on the basis of hydro-geological conditions and human impacts. All of the major geological and hydro-geological factors that affect and control groundwater movement into, through, and out of the study area were incorporated into the DRASTIC model. Parameters included; depth to groundwater, recharge, aquifer media, soil media, topography, and impact of the vadose zone. The hydraulic conductivity of the aquifer was not included in calculating the final DRASTIC index for potential contamination due to a lack of sufficient quantitative data. A Geographical Information System (GIS) was used to create a groundwater vulnerability map by overlaying the available hydro-geological data. The resulting vulnerability map was then integrated with a land use map as an additional parameter in the DRASTIC model to assess the potential risk of groundwater to pollution in the study area. The final DRASTIC model was tested using hydrochemical data from the aquifer. Around 84% of the study area was classified as being at moderate risk while the re mainder was classified as low risk. While the analysis of groundwater chemistry was not conclusive, it was encouraging to find that no well with high nitrate levels was found in the areas classified as being of low risk suggesting that the DRASTIC model for this area provided a conservative estimate of low risk areas. It is recognised that the approach adopted to produce the DRASTIC index was limited by the availability of data. However, in areas with limited secondary data, this index provides important objective information that could be used to inform local decision making.

Estimates of soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks and changes under different land use systems can help determine vulnerability to land degradation. Such information is important for countries in arid areas with high susceptibility to desertification. SOC stocks, and predicted changes between 2000 and 2030, were determined at the national scale for Jordan using The Global Environment Facility Soil Organic Carbon (GEFSOC) Modelling System. For the purpose of this study, Jordan was divided into three natural regions (The Jordan Valley, the Uplands and the Badia) and three developmental regions (North, Middle and South). Based on this division, Jordan was divided into five zones (based on the dominant land use): the Jordan Valley, the North Uplands, the Middle Uplands, the South Uplands and the Badia. This information was merged using GIS, along with a map of rainfall isohyets, to produce a map with 498 polygons. Each of these was given a unique ID, a land management unit identifier and was characterized in terms of its dominant soil type. Historical land use data, current land use and future land use change scenarios were also assembled, forming major inputs of the modelling system. The GEFSOC Modelling System was then run to produce C stocks in Jordan for the years 1990, 2000 and 2030. The results were compared with conventional methods of estimating carbon stocks, such as the mapping based SOTER method. The results of these comparisons showed that the model runs are acceptable, taking into consideration the limited availability of long-term experimental soil data that can be used to validate them. The main findings of this research show that between 2000 and 2030, SOC may increase in heavily used areas under irrigation and will likely decrease in grazed rangelands that cover most of Jordan giving an overall decrease in total SOC over time if the land is indeed used under the estimated forms of land use.