Water Quality Assessment and Zoning for Allocation of Water Resources in Golestan Province of Iran

Amirreza Sharifan¹ Hossein Sharifan² Shahla Safari³

1) Department of Civil Engineering, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran,
2) Associate Professor, Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Department of Water Engineering, Gorgan, Iran,
3) Graduated of the Department of Water Engineering, Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources,

Publication : 7th International Conference on Applied Researches in Science & Engineering (7carse.com)
Abstract :
This research investigates the temporal variations of groundwater quality parameters in the Gorgan-Qareh Su basin, located in the Golestan province, including salinity (EC), acidity (pH), anions, cations, sodium absorption ratio (SAR), and total dissolved solids (TDS) from 2001to 2010. The spatial variations of groundwater quality parameters in 2009 were also examined using the geostatistical Kriging method. Furthermore, station categorization was performed using statistical analysis in the SAS software. Finally, the water quality status of the stations in 2009 and their long-term averages were determined to allocate water resources appropriately for agricultural, drinking, and industrial purposes in the Gorgan-Qareh Su basin. Furthermore, according to the results obtained from the water quality analysis, in the first half of 2009, slightly more than half of the stations were slightly saline. In the second half of 2009, in terms of water quality for industrial purposes, 66% of the stations had usable water.
Keywords : Water quality Geostatistics Cluster analysis Time series Schuler diagram Wilcox diagram.