Studies of River Water Quality Using River Bank Filtration in Uttarakhand, India

Abstract

The poor water quality, bacterial contamination, seasonal variation, uncertainty in monsoon, lack of sustainability etc. are some major challenges of the water sector in the Himalayan region of India. To tackle the major problem of water quality, River Bank Filtration (RBF) has been applied in Uttarakhand as a domestic water pre-treatment technology. This technique is found to be effective for removal of turbidity and bacterial contamination present in surface water of four rivers of Uttarakhand, namely Alaknanda, Mandakini, East Nayar, and Pinder. The present paper reveals the improved water quality of rivers produced through RBF in a sustainable manner as compared to surface river water being supplied for drinking purpose. The classification of water quality using Pearson correlation followed by Piper trilinear and Chadha’s diagrams further provide support to the better water quality through RBF. Moreover, the results of Water Quality Index (WQI) also reflect the excellent water quality with ‘A-Grade’ of all river water samples obtained after RBF process in comparison to normal river water samples having good water quality with ‘B-Grade’ except the Srinagar site, where the river water sample was found to be unsuitable for drinking purpose with ‘E-Grade’. Alluvial deposits of RBF sites along the banks of the four rivers show the potential of replication of RBF at large scale in the hill state of Uttarakhand.