Assessment of Spring Water Hydrogeochemistry in the Intermountain Doon Valley of the Himalayan Region Using Water Quality Indexing and Multivariate Statistical Methods

Abstract

Spring water is one the important source of fresh water in the Himalayan region which is used for drinking, irrigation, and industrial purposes. With the unprecedential rise in the urbanization and industrialization, has posed severe threats to spring water resources. The water quality of springs has severely deteriorated owing to the changes in land use patterns. In the present study, the physiochemical parameters of the spring water of intermountain Doon valley, present at the eastern Himalayan region were assessed in order to simultaneously understand the hydrogeochemistry of the region and the factors controlling the ion chemistry of water. In total nine water samples were collected from three different water springs during three different seasons and were different water quality parameters were analyzed viz. temperature, pH, electrical conductivity (EC), total dissolved solids (TDS), bicarbonate (HCO₃⁻), sulphate (SO₄²⁻), chloride (Cl⁻), nitrate (NO₃⁻), and fluoride (F⁻) total hardness (TH), calcium (Ca²⁺), magnesium (Mg²⁺), sodium (Na⁺) and potassium (K⁺). The heavy metal analysis (for Cu, Pb, Ni, Cr and Cd) for all the three seasons was found to be below the BIS threshold for drinking water quality. The total coliform and E. coli tests were conducted and was found to above the BIS standard's permissible limits. The Water Quality Index (WQI) was evaluated to check the suitability of water for drinking purposes and as per WQI index water and was found to be under the good category for drinking purposes. The spring water have fallen under the excellent to good category for irrigation purposes. The high ratio of Ca²⁺ + Mg²⁺ / Na⁺ + K⁺ and a low ratio of Na⁺ + K⁺ /TZ⁺ indicated the dominance of carbonate weathering in the studied area. The piper trilinear diagram indicated the Ca²⁺-Mg²⁺-HCO₃ and Ca²⁺-Mg²⁺–HCO₃^– -SO₄²⁻ were dominant hydro-chemical facies in the study area.

Graphical Abstract