Assessment of the water quality of Bar-Bula Village well waters, Tafawa Balewa local government area, Bauchi State, Nigeria

Abstract

There was a report of health challenges in our study area due to the consumption of water from wells sited in the community. The research was aimed at assessing the water quality parameters of the wells consumed by the villagers towards providing information on the possible health implication(s) of its consumption. Two sampling sites were selected, well 1 and well 2, which were hitherto the sole sources of water in the village. Physicochemical and microbiological quality parameters of samples were done in order to assess their conformance with the specification of Nigerian Standard for drinking water quality (NIS 554-2015). The results indicated that all physical water quality parameters have their mean concentration values below the maximum permissible limits, except colour which had total mean concentrations of 16.5 ± 0.65 TCU and 15.3 ± 0.65 TCU for well 1 and well 2 respectively, are relatively above the allowable unit range of 15 TCU (NIS-554-2015). The water quality assessment of wells also revealed high concentration of Cadmium (0.11 mg L-1 and 0.16 mg L-1, for well 1 and 2 respectively as against 0.003 mg L-1 specified by standard) and Magnesium (185 mg L-1 and 105 mg L-1 for well 1 and 2 respectively as against the maximum permissible limit of 20 mg L-1 specified by the standard). The microbial values of samples fall below the maximum permissible limit prescribed by the NIS standard. From the study, it was concluded that the presence of Cadmium in the well waters indicated that the water is unfit for consumption.