Hydro-Chemical analysis of the ground water of the Basaltic Catchments: Upper Bhatsai Region, Maharastra.

Abstract

Water being an excellent solvent tends to dissolve the minerals in the geological system. The chemical nature of the ground water is influenced by several factors such as chemical weathering of the country rocks and interaction with the country rocks. The importance of the hydrochemical analysis underlies the fact that the chemistry of the ground water can directly be rated with the source of water, climate, and geology of the region. In this paper chemical analysis of the ground water has been carried out for upper Bhatsai region in Maharastra. There are eight water quality variables (SO4 2- , Na ++ , K + , Mg 2+ , Ca 2+ , NO 3- , TH, and pH) and the specific Conductance and Total Dissolved Solids were selected for this analysis. In this paper a) The values of water quality parameters were analyzed using statistical methods, b) the existence of trends and the evaluation of the best-fitted models were performed in order to classify the quality of the ground water. The geochemical analysis of the water samples has shown that it is free from certain anomalies and the water is suitable for human and cattle consumption. However, the presence of certain degree of anions indicates that the ground water in the study area is facing stress which could change the quality of the water in the near future. The quality of water resources is a subject of ongoing concern. The assessment of long-term water quality changes is also a challenging problem. During the last decades, water quality of many rivers in India has been done using standard measurements techniques. In the present study, water sam- ples were collected from cased wells during post-monsoon (December) period in order to determine their physical and chemical properties. The location of the samples is given in Fig. (1). Chemical analysis were carried out based on the procedures stipulated by APHA (1995, 1989) (1, 2); and Hem (1959) (3) and the chemical analysis data is given in Table 1. Concentration of total dissolved solids (TDS), total hardness (TH), total carbon oxide (CO2) and chloride (Cl - ) were determined by using the standard methods (4-7). 2. STUDY AREA The study area is situated in upper Bhatsai basin of Ma- harastra and falling under the latitudes 19°30.9´ and 19°13.18´ and longitudes 73°14.55´ and 73°21.43´, covering an area of approximately 59.5208 km 2 . The study area falls in the survey of India topological map numbered 47E/7. This is located in the northern part of the Thane district of Ma- harashtra that includes area around Shahpur and adjacent areas. The location of the study area is shown in Fig. (2) and the location map of the water samples is given in Fig. (1).