Estimation of quality of surface water of Dniester river basin within Lviv and Khmelnytsk regions

Abstract

The problem of deterioration of the ecological condition of river basins of Ukraine is extremely important. Particular attention is paid to transboundary rivers, which include the Dniester River. The article describes the physical and geographical conditions of the Dniester basin, analyzes the scale of water use and discharge of return water in to the surface reservoirs in the basin. The use of water resources of the basin by different sectors of the economy is studied. 50% in Lviv region and 72% in Khmelnytsk region of abstracted water is used for commercial and drinking purposes, respectively 30% and 25% - for production. The largest sources of river basin pollution within Lviv and Khmelnytsk regions are considered. The main pollutants of surface water bodies in Lviv region in terms of the amount of effluents are enterprises of housing and communal services, enterprises of heat and power, chemical and petrochemical, machine-building and food industries. Among the enterprises of Khmelnytsk region, the largest volumes of wastewater discharges are carried out by the enterprises of heat and power, housing and communal services, food and construction industries. It is established that the major factors influencing the deterioration of surface in the river basin are disposals of sewage. The ecological danger from hydrosphere pollution in the Dniester basin has been assessed on the basis of pollutant concentrations. The results of monitoring water pollution in the river Dniester basin testified that the main pollutants that exceed the level compared to the maximum permissible concentration are nitrites, and for its tributaries river Lug and river Smotrych also ammonium salt, nitrates, sulfates and phosphates. As a result of a comprehensive assessment of the water quality of the river basin, the characteristics assigned to them are weakly and moderately polluted. Except for pollution of water objects, the urgent problem demanding the solution is the acting landscape structure in the basin of river Dniester. The disturbed structure of territories is the result of excessive agricultural land use and reduction of the area of natural lands. We came up with the priority tasks are to minimize the discharges of polluted return water into the water bodies, to improve the economic mechanism of water use and implement of water protection measures, to optimize the landscape-ecological structure of the territory, in particular increase the areas of nature reserve fund.