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Hydrogeochemical Processes Controlling the Water Chemistry of a Closed Saline Lake Located in Sahara Desert: Lake Qarun, Egypt

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Abstract

We present here the first detailed hydrogeochemical study about Lake Qarun. It is a closed, saline, and alkaline lake located in the North African Sahara Desert. It has no outflow except by evaporation. This lake is the deepest area in the Fayoum Depression with elevation 43 m below sea level. In this area, Nile River is the main source of water and Lake Qarun acts as the main reservoir of all drainage waters. Along the flow path of water, the salinity of water increases with increasing proximity to Lake Qarun and the water chemistry has developed from Ca–Mg–HCO3 at head waters to Na–Cl–SO4 in low lands and in Lake Qarun. The main processes that control the water chemistry in the studied area are dissolution of soluble salts along with continuous evapoconcentration. The progressive evaporation of drainage water inflow has increased the concentrations of Na, Mg, Cl, and SO4 in Lake Qarun water, while Ca and HCO3 have been depleted through CaCO3 precipitation. This is confirmed by the application of Hardie and Eugster’s model parallel with a PHREEQC simulated evaporation model. Both models demonstrated that the evolution of lake water during evaporation should reach the final composition of “Na–Mg–SO4–Cl.” Oxygen isotope (δ18O) values of the studied water samples showed a strong positive correlation with electrical conductivity values supporting the effect of evapoconcentration process on the evolution of the lake brine. This study presented an integrated geochemical approach that can help in understanding similar cases studies in arid environments.

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Acknowledgments

We thank all staff members working at Qarun Protected Area in Fayoum Depression for their invaluable help during the field work and samples collection. The authors are very grateful to the Lappeenranta University of Technology (Finland) for providing financial support to this study. Also, the first author would like to thank the Egyptian Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research for the granted scholarship. We thank our reviewers for their helpful input to improve this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Green Chemistry, LUT Chemistry Department, Lappeenranta University of Technology, Sammonkatu 12, 50130, Mikkeli, Finland

    Mahmoud S. M. Abdel Wahed & Mika Sillanpää

  2. Geology Department, Faculty of Science, Beni-Suef University, Beni Suef, Egypt

    Mahmoud S. M. Abdel Wahed, Essam A. Mohamed & Mohamed I. El-Sayed

  3. Centre National de Recherche en Sciences des Matériaux, Technopole Borj Cedria, B.P. 73, 8027, Soliman, Tunisia

    Adel M’nif

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  1. Mahmoud S. M. Abdel Wahed
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  2. Essam A. Mohamed
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  3. Mohamed I. El-Sayed
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  4. Adel M’nif
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  5. Mika Sillanpää
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Correspondence to Mahmoud S. M. Abdel Wahed.

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Abdel Wahed, M.S.M., Mohamed, E.A., El-Sayed, M.I. et al. Hydrogeochemical Processes Controlling the Water Chemistry of a Closed Saline Lake Located in Sahara Desert: Lake Qarun, Egypt. Aquat Geochem 21, 31–57 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10498-015-9253-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10498-015-9253-3

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