Risk hazard mapping of groundwater contamination using long-term monitoring data of shallow drinking water wells

Abstract

Long-term monitoring data from over 10 000 shallow drinking water wells in the county of Osnabrück (2121 km 2) were used for generating regionalized time-averaged maps of top aquifer contamination. Using these approach local impacts can be distinguished from wide spread contamination with agrochemicals (nitrate, pesticides). Spatial databases of land-use patterns, livestock figures, soil and meteorological data are stored in a Geographical Information System (ARC/INFO). They were overlayed with regionalized aquifer contamination to facilitate the hazard mapping of top aquifer contamination.