Assessment and Spatial Mapping of Groundwater Quality Parameters Using Metal Pollution Indices, Graphical Methods and Geoinformatics

Abstract

The aim was to assess groundwater pollutants and perform their spatial mapping in Mitrovica, Republic of Kosova. Samples were collected from ten different locations in 2018 and various physical and chemical constituents were measured, such as temperature, pH, EC, TDS, major ions (Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, K+, SO4 2-, HCO3 -, Cl-, NO3 -) and heavy metals (As, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb, Zn, Cd). The water suitability for drinking was assessed by Pollution Index (PI), Nemerow’s Integrated Pollution Index (NIPI), Heavy Metal Evaluation Index (HEI), Ecological Risk Index (ERI), Overall Index of Pollution (OIP), Heavy Metal Pollution Index (HPI) and Metal Index (MI). The majority of indices show that the water is moderately polluted, whereas certain indices show it is severely polluted. Further, factor analysis was performed to know the source of the pollutant, factor 1 (22.408 %), factor 2 (21.2999 %), factor 3 (10.821 %), factor 4 (14.859 %), factor 5 (10.743 %) and factor 6 (13.183 %), the cumulative percent of total variance explained by all the factor is (93.313 %) suggest that heavy metals enter the water system due to anthropogenic activities. Cluster analysis show three dominant groups, whereas factor analyses show six dominant factors. Additionally, spatial interpolation techniques were applied to generate thematic maps of 10 m resolution.