Determination of Water Quality in Springs of Ekaterinburg and Sverdlovsk Oblast

Abstract

This article reported a study of water quality in 31 springs of the city of Ekaterinburg and the Sverdlovsk Oblast. We determined that water in only 7 springs (22%) fully met the requirements of sanitary norms from the point of view of content of chemical and radioactive pollutants. In 17 cases, water did not meet the requirements of the norms for the chemical factor, in 4 cases – for the radiation factor, and in 3 cases – for both the chemical and radiation factors. Among the natural radionuclides, only 222Rn showed levels higher than intervention level (60 Bq/L); the maximum activity concentration of radon was found to be 161 Bq / l (Pavlovsky spring). At the same time, activity concentrations of uranium and thorium did not exceed the level of intervention. A detailed analysis of the content of natural radionuclides showed the absence of correlations between the activity concentrations of radon, uranium and thorium in spring waters. Inconsistency of spring waters with sanitary standards for chemical factors in the vast majority of cases was associated with excess MPC for iron. Also, in a number of samples, an excess of the MPC for manganese and barium was found, while in the spring Europe-Asia (Yekaterinburg) an almost 9-fold excess of the MPC for barium was found.