Assessment of groundwater quality for irrigation: a case study from Bandalamottu lead mining area, Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh, South India

Abstract

Quality of water resources in the Bandalamottu area of Guntur District of Andhra Pradesh in South India is facing a serious challenge due to Pb mining. Therefore, 40 groundwater samples were collected from this area to assess their hydrogeochemistry and suitability for irrigation purposes. The groundwater samples were analyzed for distribution of chemical elements Ca 2? , Mg 2? , Na ? , K ? , HCO 3-, CO 3 2-, F-, Cl-, and SO 4 2-. It also includes pH, electrical conductivity, total hardness, non-carbonate hardness and total alkalinity. The parameters, such as sodium absorption ratio (SAR), adjusted SAR, sodium percentage, potential salinity, residual sodium carbonate, non-carbonate hardness, Kelly's ratio, magnesium ratio, permeability index, indices of base exchange (IBE) and Gibbs ratio were also calculated. The major hydrochemical facieses were Ca-HCO 3 , Ca-Na-HCO 3 and Ca-Mg-Cl types. The result of saturation index calculated by Visual MINTEQ software combined with Gibbs diagram and IBE findings indicate that, dolomite and calcite dissolution and reverse ion exchange can be a major process controlling the water chemistry in the study area. The results also showed that the salinity (85 %, C3 class) and alkalinity due to high concentration of HCO 3 and CO 3 and low Ca:Mg molar ratio (97.5 %, \1), are the major problems with water for irrigation usage. As a result, the quality of the groundwater is not suitable for sustainable crop production and soil health without appropriate remediation.

Geochemical characterization and evaluation of groundwater suitability for domestic and agricultural utility in semi-arid region of Basara, Telangana State, South India

“…Moreover, Frenkel (1984) has concluded that arid and semi-arid regions of surface and subsurface water was nearly saturated with respect to CaCO 3 , and also contains high concentrations of sulfate and calcium which could be precipitated in the soil. Visual MINTEQ (3.1) has widely been used to estimate the saturation index (SI) of the groundwater with respect to mineral phases (Gustafsson 2012; Nagaraju et al 2014;Appelo and Postma 1996). The solubility products of several minerals which Fig.…”

Hydrogeochemical investigation of groundwater in shallow coastal aquifer of Khulna District, Bangladesh

“…The over dependence on groundwater for drinking, agricultural and industrial sector and different climatic and natural phenomenon causes coastal groundwater contamination (Srinivas et al 2015). Besides, different geochemical processes in groundwater governing the chemical characteristics of groundwater, is well documented in many parts of the world by many authors i.e., Montety et al (2008), Jalali (2009), Manjusree et al (2009), Thilagavathi et al (2012, Sivasubramanian et al (2013), Nagaraju et al (2014), Kumar et al (2015), Islam et al (2016a, b) and Balaji et al (2016). Geochemical studies of groundwater provide a better understanding of water quality and possible changes .…”

Assessment of Groundwater Quality and Evolution of Hydrochemical Facies around Tummalapalle Area, Cuddapah District, Andhra Pradesh, South India

“…These diagrams are widely employed to assess the functional sources of dissolved chemical constituents, such as precipitation, rock, and evaporation dominance [31]. A similar study has been carried out by [11] and emphasized the mechanisms that control the chemistry of groundwater in Karnataka. The Gibbs ratios are calculated with the formulae given below:…”

“…Mixed sources may be discovered by using factor analysis, a statistical procedure of multivariate analysis [9,10]. In this context, thermodynamic water equilibrium studies are usually made with sophisticated computer programs, such as MINTEQ [11].…”