Characterization of Physicochemical Water Quality Parameters of River Gudar (Oromia region, West Shewa Zone, Ethiopia) for Drinking Purpose

Abstract

Due to various natural and anthropogenic activities, quality of water was deteriorated in most towns of the country. These changes make or forced the community to depend on unsafe and poor water consumption. River Gudar is one of the rivers found in towns of the country, and exposed to many anthropogenic activities done around the town. Importance of river Gudar is strongly linked to Domestic consumption, Irrigation, Industrial (HAEF) and other public health. Under the investigation physicochemical parameters and selected heavy metals for the quality of river Gudar for drinking purpose were characterized. The laboratory results for both physicochemical parameters and selected heavy metals were: Alkalinity (154 ± 15.556 mg/L), pH (8.44), Electrical Conductivity (316.47 ± 72.802 Scm -1 ), TDS (149.37 ± 20.64 mg/L), Ammonia (41.00 ± 1.19 mg/L), Phosphate (3.50 ± 0.32mg/L), Total Hardness (156.87 ± 8.46 mg/L CaCO3), Sodium (17.44 ± 2.87mg/L), Potassium (8.51 ± 0.33 mg/L) and some selected heavy metals such as Cu (0.29 ± 0.04 mg/L ), Pb (2.5 ± 0.25 mg/L), Zn (0.63 ± 0.24 mg/L), Cd (0.79 ± 0.19 mg/L) and Ag (0.35 ± 0.17 mg/L) for water sample.