DETERMINATION OF GROUNDWATER POTENTIAL AREAS IN KADUNA METROPOLIS, KADUNA, NIGERIA

Abstract

Groundwater is one of the major resources important for sustainable growth and development. Proper management of the resources is therefore important to meet all the water requirements for human existence to continue. In this study, an investigation is made to explore for groundwater potential areas of Kaduna Metropolis, Kaduna State using remote sensing and GIS technique. The data used for the study are as follows; Landsat 8 (OLI) 30m, Aster data (30m), Geologic map, Soil map and Topographic map was used to generate the factors such as; Land use/cover, Slope, Geomorphology, Geologic rock types, soil textures and drainage density. All the factors and its attributes were weighted and rated respectively and were classified according to their importance to groundwater occurrence using the modified DRASTIC model and the weighted overlay technique was used to create a groundwater potential map of the metropolis. Groundwater potential map were classified into four categories that best describes the potential of each area. These classes are; Poor (21%), Moderate (23%), Good (26%) and Very Good (30.2%) groundwater potential which was found to be concentrated in the central part of the metropolis. This result was verified against existing borehole data and field observations to validate the accuracy and was found to be 76% accurate. The study demonstrated the effectiveness of Remote Sensing and GIS as an effective tool in delineation and identification of groundwater potential areas.