Abstract
Groundwater contamination and vulnerability in urbanized areas are of major concern and need proper attention. Several models including the DRASTIC model are used to evaluate groundwater vulnerability. In the present study, a modified DRASTIC model named as DRASTICA was used, by including anthropogenic influence as a model parameter. The study included an innovative methodology to characterize the anthropogenic influence by using satellite observations of night-lights from human settlements as a proxy and land-use/land-cover surrounding the urbanized area in Lucknow, the capital city of the most populous State of Uttar Pradesh in India. Geographical information system was used for spatial integration of different parameter maps. The groundwater vulnerability to pollution indicated that about 0.7 % area is covered under very high vulnerable zone, 24.5 % area under high vulnerable zone, 66.6 % area under moderately vulnerable zone and 8.2 % area under low vulnerable zone. The results were validated using nitrate concentration in ground water. It was shown that the proposed DRASTICA model performed better than conventional DRASTIC model in an urbanized environment. Sensitivity analysis indicated that anthropogenic impact and depth to water table largely influenced the groundwater vulnerability to pollution, thereby signifying that anthropogenic influence has to be addressed precisely in such studies. The modified-DRASTIC/DRASTICA model proposed in this study will help in better categorization of groundwater vulnerable zones to pollution where anthropogenic contamination is high, particularly in and around urban centers.
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Acknowledgments
AS is thankful to Ministry of Human Resources and Development (MHRD) for funding a fellowship to carry out the research. Special thanks to Raj Bhagat, Indian Institute of Remote Sensing (IIRS), Dehradun, for providing urbanization index data used in this study. Thanks are also extended to UPRSAC, CGWB, UP Jal Nigam, Lucknow, for providing all necessary data. The comments of reviewers and of the editor helped immensely in improvement of the manuscript.
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Singh, A., Srivastav, S.K., Kumar, S. et al. A modified-DRASTIC model (DRASTICA) for assessment of groundwater vulnerability to pollution in an urbanized environment in Lucknow, India. Environ Earth Sci 74, 5475–5490 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-015-4558-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-015-4558-5