The Assessment of the Diffuse Pollution from Agricultural Territories in the Upper Volga Basin and the Development of Measures to Reduce It: Case Study of the Yakhroma River

Abstract

The possible input of nutrients-pollutants into water bodies in the Upper Volga basin from agricultural lands is evaluated for the case of the Yakhroma R. with a basin area of 1437 km2. Water quality was studied along river profile to show that the sources of nutrient pollution, in addition to wastewaters from the cities of Dmitrov and Yakhroma, are agricultural lands on the water divide and a melioration object in the floodplain >9 thousand ha in area. The input of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium with surface and drainage water into river network was evaluated. It was shown that the major pollutants of either surface or drainage waters are nitrogen and potassium compounds and, to a lesser extent, phosphorus compounds. The overall normal annual volume of surface runoff in the Yakhroma basin was evaluated at 12 358 thousand m3 and that of drainage water at 15952 thousand m3. The export of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium with surface runoff is 27.36, 6.06, and 242.28 t/year, respectively; the respective values for drainage runoff are 96.88, 0.38, and 37.04 t/year. Scenarios of protection measures were developed to reduce the pollution of surface water and to clean drainage water of nitrogen and phosphorus compounds by reducing the nutrient pollution of the river by 73.7 t/year in the case of surface runoff regulation and by 160 t/year, in the case of drainage runoff treatment.