Identification of groundwater prospects in the Khammam district

Abstract

Water is our most precious natural resource. It is imperative need to human life and is a vital necessity for plant and animal life. Due to increase in population and industrial activities, water is gradually becoming a scarce commodity rather than a freely available natural resource. Even in areas where normally there is an abundant surface water supply through major, medium and minor irrigation projects, groundwater is playing an increasingly vital role in supplementing surface water. The primary objective of this paper is to identify groundwater prospects in Khammam district using Remote Sensing and Geographical Information System techniques. The present work involves creating a database both spatial and non-spatial with the help of Survey of India toposheet to a scale of 1:2, 50,000 and Remote Sensing imageries. Various thematic maps like base map, drainage map, slope map, soil map, hydrogeomorphology map, water table fluctuation map and landuse landcover maps are prepared. After integrating all thematic maps using Arc GIS 9.1 software, groundwater prospects map is generated for the study area.