Water Quality Assessment of the South-Eastern Part of Lake Lanao, Philippines

Abstract

This paper aimed at underlying some physico-chemical characteristics of the water of Lake Lanao at Poona-bayabao, Lanao Del Sur during the first quarter of 2015, by evaluating a total of eight (8) water quality parameters. Physical parameters were temperature, depth, transparency, and total suspended solids. On the other hand, the chemical parameters were pH, dissolved oxygen, phosphate and nitrate. Three sampling stations were considered in the study. Community’s knowledge, perceptions, and attitudes towards the utilization and condition of the lake were also evaluated through interview. Results showed that all assessed physico-chemical parameters still conformed to the Philippines standards set by Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) for fresh surface water as Class A as for the year 2015. One-way Anova showed no significant difference in the overall average of the physico-chemical characteristics in the three sampling stations of Lake Lanao (p > 0.05). With the results obtained, the Lake can still be a source of water supply that require complete treatment in order to meet National Standards for Drinking Water (NSDW) of the Philippines, within the year of the conduct of the study. For the assessment of community’s knowledge, perceptions, and attitudes, Kruskal-Wallis test showed that the knowledge, perceptions, and attitudes are not significantly different in terms of stations. A more comprehensive and wider range monitoring is recommended for future study about the lake.