Hydrochemical characteristics and the effects of irrigation on groundwater quality in Harran Plain,GAP Project,Turkey

Improper design, faulty planning, mismanagement and incorrect operation of irrigation schemes are the principle reasons for the deterioration of groundwater quality in a large number of countries, in particular in semi-arid and arid regions. The aim of this study is to determine the dimensions of groundwater quality after surface irrigation was begun in the semi-arid Harran Plain. Physical and chemical parameters of the groundwater including pH, temperature, electrical conductivity (EC), sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, chloride, bicarbonate, sulphate, nitrate, nitrite, ammonium, total phosphorus, total organic carbon and turbidity were determined monthly during the 2006 water year. The quality of the groundwater in the study area was assessed hydrochemically in order to determine its suitability for human consumption and agricultural purposes. In the general plain, the EC values measured were considerably above the guide level of 650 μS/cm, while nitrate in particular was found in almost all groundwater samples to be significantly above the maximum admissible concentration of 50 mg/l for the quality of water intended for human consumption as per the international and national standards. Total hardness reveals that a majority of the groundwater samples fall in the very hard water category. Interpretation of analytical data shows that Ca–HCO₃ and Ca–SO₄ are the dominant hydrochemical facies in the study area.     

A quantitative analysis on the Egyptian Mediterranean waters

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Stability of waterfront retaining wall subjected to pseudo-static earthquake forces

Waterfront retaining walls supporting dry backfill are subjected to hydrostatic pressure on upstream face and earth pressure on the downstream face. Under seismic conditions, if such a wall retains a submerged backfill, additional hydrodynamic pressures are generated. This paper pertains to a study in which the effect of earthquakes along with the hydrodynamic pressure including inertial forces on such a retaining wall is observed. The hydrodynamic pressure is calculated using Westergaard's approach, while the earth pressure is calculated using Mononobe-Okabe's pseudo-static analysis. It is observed that when the horizontal seismic acceleration coefficient is increased from 0 to 0.2, there is a 57% decrease in the factor of safety of the retaining wall in sliding mode. For investigating the effect of different parameters, a parametric study is also done. It is observed that if φ is increased from 30° to 35°, there is an increase in the factor of safety in the sliding mode by 20.4%. Similar observations were made for other parameters as well. Comparison of results obtained from the present approach with [Ebeling, R.M., Morrison Jr, E.E., 1992. The seismic design of waterfront retaining structures. US Army Technical Report ITL-92-11. Washington DC] reveal that the factor of safety for static condition (k_h=0), calculated by both the approaches, is 1.60 while for an earthquake with k_h=0.2, they differ by 22.5% due to the consideration of wall inertia in the present study.     

Response-based method for determining the extreme behaviour of floating offshore platforms

The accurate prediction of extreme excursion and mooring force of floating offshore structures due to multi-variete environmental conditions which requires the joint probability analysis of environmental conditions for the worst case situation is still impractical as the processing of large amount of met-ocean data is required. On the other hand, the simplified multiple design criteria (e.g. the N-year wave with associated winds and currents) recommended by API known as traditional method does lead neither to the N-year platform response nor to the N-year mooring force. Therefore, in order to reduce the level of conservatism as well as uncertainties involved in the traditional method the response-based method can be used as a reliable alternative approach. In this paper this method is described. In order to perform the calculations faster using large databases of sea states, Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) is designed and employed. In the paper the response-based method is applied to a 200,000 tdw FPSO and the results are discussed.     

Applications of AnnAGNPS model for soil loss estimation and nutrient loading for Malaysian conditions

The study evaluated the performance and suitability of AnnAGNPS model in assessing runoff, sediment loading and nutrient loading under Malaysian conditions. The watershed of River Kuala Tasik in Malaysia, a combination of two sub-watersheds, was selected as the area of study. The data for the year 2004 was used to calibrate the model and the data for the year 2005 was used for validation purposes. Several input parameters were computed using methods suggested by other researchers and studies carried out in Malaysia. The study shows that runoff was predicted well with an overall R² value of 0.90 and E value of 0.70. Sediment loading was able to produce a moderate result of R² = 0.66 and E = 0.49, nitrogen loading predictions were slightly better with R² = 0.68 and E = 0.53, and phosphorus loading performance was slightly poor with an R² = 0.63 and E = 0.33. The erosion map developed was in agreement with the erosion risk map produced by the Department of Agriculture, Malaysia. Rubber estates and urban areas were found to be the main contributors to soil erosion. The simulation results showed that AnnAGNPS has the potential to be used as a valuable tool for planning and management of watersheds under Malaysian conditions.     

Re-appraisal of seismicity and seismotectonics in the north-eastern Algeria Part II: 20th century seismicity and seismotectonics analysis

The main objective of the research work isthe homogenisation of the two recentAlgerian earthquake catalogues for thecommon covered period of time, from 1900 to1990, for the region under considerationlimited by [33^°N–38^°N,4^°E-9.5^°E] and the updatingof the catalogue for the twentieth century(1900–2000). To mitigate the deficiencyof the incompleteness of catalogue, aneffort was made to establish a correlationbetween surface-wave magnitude Ms andbody-wave magnitude m_b in the form ofMs = a + b (m_b). A complete, exact andhomogeneous earthquake catalogue as much aspossible, comprising 870 seismic events,has been compiled. Seismicity analysis ofthe region shows a strong concentration ofseismicity along a band of no more than400 km width oriented mainly in theeast-west direction parallel to the coast.Moreover, earthquakes in this zone arerather associated to strike-slip mechanism.The focal mechanism show a regional stressregime that corresponds to horizontalcompression in NW-SE to N-S direction. As aresult of the review of the seismicity ofnorth-eastern Algeria from the compilationof checked and corrected data and itscorrelation with other geologic andgeophysical investigations based ondocumentary sources, it was possible toconstruct a most complete seismotectonicmap. It leads also to delineate fourseismogenic zones in the Tellian Atlas, aless important zone in the Saharan Atlas, asixth zone at the boundary of both Atlasand finally, a seventh one along thecoastal zone. The seismicity-active faultscorrelation of some of these defined zonesis examined in details with a specialattention to the Saharan Atlas zone, theHodna and Biban zone as well as Soummam andBabor zone where further research workallowed to find some neotectonic featuresconsidered as a significant sign of recenttectonic activity.     

Seismic response of a cable‐stayed bridge deck under multi‐component non‐stationary random ground motion

A Markov method of analysis is presented for obtaining the seismic response of cable‐stayed bridges to non‐stationary random ground motion. A uniformly modulated non‐stationary model of the random ground motion is assumed which is specified by the evolutionary r.m.s. ground acceleration. Both vertical and horizontal components of the motion are considered to act simultaneously at the bridge supports. The analysis duly takes into account the angle of incidence of the earthquake, the spatial correlation of ground motion and the quasi‐static excitation. A cable‐stayed bridge is analysed under a set of parametric variations in order to study the non‐stationary response of the bridge. The results of the numerical study indicate that (i) frequency domain spectral analysis with peak r.m.s. acceleration as input could provide more r.m.s. response than the peak r.m.s. response obtained by the non‐stationary analysis; (ii) the longitudinal component of the ground motion significantly influences the vertical vibration of the bridge; and (iii) the angle of incidence of the earthquake has considerable influence on the deck response. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Assessment of spatial variations in water quality of Garra River at Shahjahanpur,Ganga Basin,India

Arabian Journal of Geosciences - A comprehensive study on the chemical considerations of thermal waters (springs and geothermal wells) on the performance of solute geothermometers in predicting the...     

Landslide hazard mapping in the Constantine city,Northeast Algeria using frequency ratio,weighting factor,logistic regression,weights of evidence,and analytical hierarchy process methods

Landslides constitute the most widespread and damaging natural hazards in the Constantine city. They represent a significant constraint to development and urban planning. In order to reduce the risk related to potential landslide, there is a need to develop a comprehensive landslide hazard map (LHM) of the area for an efficient disaster management and for planning development activities. The purpose of this research is to prepare and compare the LHMs of the Constantine city, by applying frequency ratio (FR), weighting factor (Wf), logistic regression (LR), weights of evidence (WOE), and analytical hierarchy process (AHP) methods used in a framework of the geographical information system (GIS). Firstly, a landslide inventory map has been prepared based on the interpretation of aerial photographs, high resolution satellite images, fieldwork, and available literature. Secondly, eight landslide-conditioning factors such as lithology, slope, exposure, rainfall, land use, distance to drainage, distance to road, and distance to fault have been considered to establish LHMs using the FR, Wf, LR, WOE, and AHP models in GIS. For verification, the obtained LHMs have been validated comparing the LHMs with the known landslide locations using the receiver operating characteristics curves (ROC). The validated results indicate that the FR method provides more accurate prediction (86.59 %) of LHMs than the WOE (82.38 %), AHP (77.86 %), Wf (77.58 %), and LR (70.45 %) models. On the other hand, the obtained results showed that all the used models in this study provided a good accuracy in predicting landslide hazard in Constantine city. The established maps can be used as useful tools for risk prevention and land use planning in the Constantine region.