Assessment of Water Quality of Bhagirathi from Gangotri Torishikesh Using R S and GIS Techniques

Abstract

Water Chemistry is a topic of research that has resulted in the development of numerous models and modeling techniques in the last few decades. It is an essential natural resource for sustainability of life on earth. Water is a vital component and is required by all the living organisms, but due to increase in human population, industrialization, use of fertilizers and different human activities a variety of effluents and chemicals are being added to water as a result of which natural water gets contaminated. The complete assessment of water quality is based on the monitoring of its Hydrology physico- chemistry and Biology. newlineTo assess the WQI a systematic study of River Bhagirathi in Uttarakhand from Gangotri to Rishikesh has been carried out. Study is based on temporal changes over the seasonal variation due to the physico-chemical changes in properties during the period from 2014 to 2017. Water samples were analyzed at five stations for various physical parameters like pH temperature turbidity odour colour conductivity total dissolved solids total suspended solids and chemical parameters like DO BOD COD Chloride Sulphate Sodium Potassium Calcium Magnesium Heavy metals like Nickel Lead Cadmium Chromium Iron Zinc Manganese Mercury and Arsenic. Sampling was done in three consequent years 2014 to 2017 at each of the five sampling stations in three seasons summer, monsoon and winter and then further a comparative study has been done by taking into consideration the average mean values seasonally for each parameter under study. newlineGIS system and RS are the two important tools which are being used in the present study to analyze the water resources development and planning. RS makes it possible to collect data on dangerous or inaccessible areas. RS applications include monitoring of deforestation forest type and depth sounding of water land usage crop pattern wild life and weather. RS also replaces costly and slow data collection on the ground, ensuring in the process that areas or objects are not disturbed. GIS relates