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Principal component, chemical, bacteriological, and isotopic analyses of Oued-Souf groundwaters (revised)

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Abstract

Oued-Souf City, located in the northwestern part of Algeria, has rapidly grown and been urbanized. The city and surrounding areas depend heavily on groundwater as a water source for drinking, as well as domestic, industrial, and agricultural uses. Comprehensively understanding the chemistry of the groundwater provides insight into the interaction of water with the environment and contributes to better overall resource management. The phreatic groundwaters are SO4–Ca in character. These waters are hard with a high salinity, which poses a distinct danger for plants. Furthermore, major chemical elements in the water have concentrations above the values recommended by World Health Organization. The phreatic groundwaters display bacteriological germs in sampled waters, and high concentrations of nitrates were detected in the samples due to the absence of a formal sanitation network. In this work, stable and radioactive isotopes are used to understand the water origin of the phreatic groundwaters. The present isotopic study suggests that the groundwaters from the Oued-Souf phreatic aquifer are composed of two primary components, one from infiltrating recent rain waters and the other one from deep captive groundwaters. Herein, descriptive statistics, correlation matrices, and factor analyses were employed to understand the hydrochemistry of the groundwater in the phreatic aquifer in the Oued-Souf area.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth Resources Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kyushu University, 744 Motooka, Nishi-ku, 819-0395, Fukuoka, Japan

    H. Saibi & S. Ehara

  2. Faculty of Earth Science, University of Science and Technology Houari Boumedienne, Algiers, Algeria

    M. Mesbah

  3. Dating and Isotope Tracing Department, Algiers Nuclear Research Centre, P.O Box 399, Alger-RP, 16000, Algiers, Algeria

    A. S. Moulla

  4. Water and Environmental Laboratory, Faculty of Technology, Blida 1 University, Blida, Algeria

    A. H. Guendouz

Authors
  1. H. Saibi
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  2. M. Mesbah
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  3. A. S. Moulla
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  4. A. H. Guendouz
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  5. S. Ehara
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Correspondence to H. Saibi.

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Unintentionally a co-author name was forgotten in the retracted paper.

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Saibi, H., Mesbah, M., Moulla, A.S. et al. Principal component, chemical, bacteriological, and isotopic analyses of Oued-Souf groundwaters (revised). Environ Earth Sci 75, 272 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-015-4878-5

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