Groundwater Quality and Land Use Change (A Case Study: Shahrekord Aquifer, Iran)

More than 98 percent of the earth’s drinking water supply comes from groundwater. It needsprotection from possible contamination, especially in urban areas where wastewater production ishigh. Most area of Shahrekord plain is under the cultivation and irrigation water comes from thegroundwater. Furthermore, urban sewage discharges to the groundwater, in some parts of theShahrekord plain. In this study, 18 wells were selected for water sampling. The effects of landuse wereevaluated on Total Dissolved Solids (TDS), Total Hardness (TH), Electrical Conductivity (EC),Nitrate (NO3–), Nitrite (NO2–) and Sulfate (SO42-). The samples were selected in different seasons;spring, summer and autumn 2004. A Nested Complete Randomized Design (NCRD) was used forstatistical analysis with 18 samples per plot. The results show that there were significant differences(P<0.05) between value of NO3–, NH4+ concentration and EC in farmlands and urban areas. There wasno observed any significant difference on the NO2–, pH and TH value. It was higher in farmlands thanin urban areas. The result shows that there are a significant difference (P<0.01) on NO3– concentrationin different seasons.

کلیدواژه ها:

Groundwater contamination ، Urban and agricultural landuse