Impact of hydro-geological environment on availability of groundwater using analytical hierarchy process (AHP) and geospatial techniques: A study from the upper Kangsabati river basin

• Published in: Groundwater for sustainable development 2020-10, Vol.11, p.100419, Article 100419
• Main Authors: Ghosh, Debasis, Mandal, Mrinal, Banerjee, Monali, Karmakar, Manas
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: AHP; Groundwater; Hydro-geology; Kangsabati river basin; RS and GIS
• ISSN: 2352-801X; 2352-801X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.gsd.2020.100419

The upper Kangsabati river basin is situated on the extended part of ‘Chhotanagpur Granitic or Granite Gneiss Complex’ (CGGC) of West Bengal and Jharkhand. People of this hard rock terrain suffer severely from water scarcity during scorching summer. To delineate groundwater potential zones of the study region, seven hydro-geological factors, such as geology, lineament, slope, drainage, rainfall, soil and land use land cover are considered. The Cartosat-1 DEM of IRS, LISS-3 image of IRS, geological map of GSI, soil map of NBSS&LUP and rainfall data of CWC are arranged and processed in ArcGIS, Erdas Imagine and PCI Geometica softwares as per requirements to prepare seven individual thematic layers. To assign proper weight of an individual factor based on its level of influence in the occurrence of groundwater, the AHP model is adopted to serve the purpose. Finally, the map of the groundwater potential zones is produced by integrating all the seven layers into one in ArcGIS software. The map of groundwater potential zones of the upper Kangsabati river basin shows that an area of 1819.45 km2 (53.33%) is of good to very good potentiality of groundwater. Only an area of 591.23 km2 (17.34%) is identified as very poor to poor zones of groundwater prospect. The verification of the study is also done by computing an accuracy assessment. The result of the overall accuracy assessment of the study is recorded to be 79.77%, while the Kappa co-efficient is calculated to be 0.73. [Display omitted] •Groundwater assessment of the upper Kangsabati river basin, West Bengal is done with the help of remote sensing (RS) and geographical information system (GIS) and analytical hierarchy process (AHP).•Selected seven hydro-geological factors influence the occurrence and movement of groundwater and slope is found to be most dominating factor.•An area of 53.33% of the river basin bears good to very good prospect of groundwater.•The validation of the applied model in preparation of groundwater potential zones map turns out with a good result.