Water quality in underground dam areas in the semiarid region of rio grande do norte, Brazil

ABSTRACT The federal public agencies have prioritized the financing of underground dams as a strategy to decrease water scarcity in rural semiarid regions in Brazil. The objective of this work was to evaluated water quality in underground dams, for agricultural irrigation purposes, in Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, at the end of the dry season in 2018 and at the end of the rainy season in 2019. The variables with the greatest impact on water quality were identified through multivariate analysis, using the software Statistica 7.0. The results showed that concentrations of variables correlated with salinity and ion toxicity in water of the dams decreased after the rainy season, whereas those correlated with clogging of localized irrigation systems increased. Salinity, sodicity, and/or toxicity in areas of underground dams were correlated with natural mineralization of geological components of soils; however, they also were affected by rainfall with marine hygroscopic nuclei, presence of rural clusters and corrals, and decomposition of organic matter in the damming area. The variables correlated with salinity presented higher effect on the hydrochemical variability of water within these dams in both sampling periods; electrical conductivity and chloride ions were the most significant variables.