Can geology of a watershed impact the water quality?

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I am doing GIS data visualization for watershed geology, just curious to know can geology of a watershed impact the water quality?

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5 Answers

  1. Our Iowa Aquifers have some farmers using "French Drains" or illegal AG drainage wells or ditches or man made flood channels directing farm drainage to Aquifer Recharge Areas thus causing some high levels of 2 very water soluble CAFO and Anhydrous Ammonia Nitrogen fertilizers in our Source Waters Downstream.  Anhydrous Ammonia draws Arsenic into our Source Water for wells Downstream and contributes to drawing Lead from our water distribution lines.  When farmers Downstream from polluting farmers are told by the DNR to Chlorinate for the CAFO bacteria, we caused our own health issues to be worse as Chlorine and the high Ammonia Nitrogen as N levels developed Trihalomethanes that kill.  The Lead and Arsenic levels are increasing in wells Downstream after the levels of Anhydrous Ammonia wash through to the Gulf where the Dead Zones are growing.  The US has to stop the Point Source Polluting farmers and support the Farmers who have spent their lives, and some who were murdered for following our Drainage Laws and the Clean Water Act.  Proud to be Adam Lack's Mom and Gary Lack's wife, two killed because they tried to stop one Plume that has killed more...

  2. YES. Earlier comments has covered many points. especially, by Ms Vishakha. I wish to add some - in many areas rainfall is restricted to few months. However, river can be perennial due to ground water contribution to flow. This subsurface passage of water takes some time to exit and formation minerals gets dissolved. Thus quality of water will change seasonally, also depending upon surface run-off and ground water springs.

  3. Hi Chris, The quick answer to your question is very much so. Here in the UK we use GIS mapping as part of the Drinking Water Safety Plan process for the catchment risk assessments. Much is on a 2D basis for land use and potential routes of travel for the individual catchment profiles. However I have used a 3D mapping for a particularly challenging chemical issue. Recommend you focus on the 50 and 400 day travel zones of each sources to highlight any activities which can alert to microbial and chemical risks.

  4. @Vish - I am attaching a paper here itself. It took me like 10 minutes to upload the doument (site is slow) so i am directlz adding link here. Cheers http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2340&context=etd

  5. I am considering that you are referring to water quality of runoff from the watershed. Yes, the geology of the catchment has a high effect on water quality. 

    Primarily by the lithology of the area, the resident time of water to interact with rocks, climatic conditions etc. Secondly the water quality can be changed by the anthropogenic activities in an area, like runoff interacts with soil, pesticides -fertilizers used, etc.

    There are many publications on this topic, I suggest other members to contribute to this discussion by sharing some published papers if they have. 

    2 Comments

    1. The geological rock formation in north central Iowa, USA Aquifers can contain rock with high levels of Arsenic that when Anhydrous Ammonia and CAFO Nitrogen fertilizers are illegally drained into our aquifer, by Point Source Pollution, the Ammonia draws the Arsenic from the rock into our Source Water and also draws Lead into our drinking water from our well pipes and distribution lines.

    2. The Cerro Gordo County Department of Public Health tries to guard residents from contaminants in private wells. They could not do that without access to Iowa taxpayer funded data. After Sandy Davis complained about her water in 2004, as I had also complained to the IDNR in an adjoining Midwest Iowa (USA) county in 2004 and earlier and also to the Mitchell County Department of Public Health in 2004, the Iowa DNR finally set up a 3-D GIS mapping system using IDNR well drilling permit data in the later part of 2015 and using only the Big Databases of well tests done for Arsenic one of the 600+ contaminants in Iowa's Hygienic Labs tests for Cerro Gordo County.  But the Iowa DNR still does not give access to Iowans for the other over 600 possible contaminants that cause the IDNR to condemn our wells.  They have contaminant Big Databases for other Midwest states as well, stored in the Iowa Hygienic Labs that with this new IDNR 3D GIS system, if the well owners had access to the list of contaminants testing positive in wells around theirs, we could know what was causing the miscellaneous masses and tumors in our cattle and pigs, and Iowans.  This would also cause Drainage Laws to be enforced if Iowans knew what was causing their cancers, skin, eye, throat erosions, celia in their intestines being burned and lung damage, COPD, etc.  But the problem stopping Iowa from releasing the increasing levels of the Ammonia Nitrogen as N well test data is that the Big Oil Corps have given too much money to Politicians especially our past and present Governors.  In my Civil Rights suit to get access to these big databases of the well tests on my own wells that they still hide, the Iowa AG assistant attorney says it's too POLITICAL to tell Iowans we are drinking Anhydrous Ammonia Nitrogen fertilizer.