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Groundwater contamination from point sources. A hazard index to protect water supply wells in intermediate cities
- Source :
- Groundwater for Sustainable Development. 10:100363
- Publication Year :
- 2020
- Publisher :
- Elsevier BV, 2020.
-
Abstract
- Fresh water is of vital importance and therefore, the availability of water in urban areas has been a priority objective in the world for many years. One of the greatest challenges related to any natural resource management process is to achieve the best possible compatibility between the “ideal” and the “possible” situations. Nowadays, urban water management is a key objective particularly in intermediate cities of developing countries where human and economic resources in governmental agencies are limited. So, it is necessary to count with a tool as simple as possible, in order to allow control efforts to be prioritised. The aim of this paper is to develop a hazard index (HI), in order to identify which point sources of groundwater contamination need to be more frequently controlled and to recognise public supply wells that may be threatened. This index was applied in Mar del Plata city, located in the south-east of the Buenos Aires province, Argentina. The HI was defined as a weighted sum of three variables: Potential Contamination Load (PCL), Effluent Disposal mode (ED) and the distance from the point source to groundwater supply wells or Well Protection Areas (WP). HI results for each point source showed that all buried fuel tanks, soil and stone quarries present high HI as well as 2% of the industries. On the other hand, 90% of the inventoried industries and a landfill present the lowest HI values. Some recommendations based on two strategies (mitigation or prevention) are proposed.
- Subjects :
- Environmental Engineering
business.industry
0208 environmental biotechnology
Geography, Planning and Development
Developing country
Water supply
02 engineering and technology
Hazard index
010501 environmental sciences
Contamination
01 natural sciences
020801 environmental engineering
Threatened species
Environmental Chemistry
Environmental science
Natural resource management
business
Water resource management
Effluent
Groundwater
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
Water Science and Technology
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 2352801X
- Volume :
- 10
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Groundwater for Sustainable Development
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi...........2d25f9710750070c09d6f8630a3629ef