Abstract: During the past three decades, wastewater production has increased tremendously due to the population increase and the continuous rural population resettlements in the cities seeking a presumed better standard of living .Global and regional climatic changes have contributed to the issue in addition to the exhaustion of the environment, including water ways and water bodies. The River Tigris receives it share of water quality deterioration and scarcity. Therefore, full scale environmental precautions have to be setup urgently in order to protect this magnificent and historic water resource. In the absence of sewage infrastructure services in Mosul city, most of the urban wastewaters (domestic, industrial and agricultural return flows) reach the river through natural canals passing through the city. In addition, the city solid waste services are managed improperly which causes further suffering of the environment. It is estimated that 5 to 6 m3/s of mostly settled raw waste water is disposed of into the river as gray water. In order to investigate the most potent pollutants existing in the river water and their seasonal variation, this research work has been initiated in order to evaluate and model the variation of these pollutants with distance and time as the river passes through Mosul city, their environmental impact on the quality of river Tigris and to define their use status as compared with potable water quality criteria. The results of the study indicate that the concentration of some of the pollutants in the river water is affected by the highly polluted wastewater disposed into the reach under consideration which exceeds the permissible limits of potable water on some occasions. Pollutant variation as expressed by the derived models indicates that the pollutants flowing downstream vary considerably with the river flow rate and/or time of the year. A modified Water Quality Index (WQI) has been suggested and implemented over the reach under investigation. The water quality is classified as clean water or 17% polluted on the average. Suitable instantaneous and long run solutions are proposed in order to reduce and /or even eliminate (as a final goal) the decline in the water quality of the river Tigris while flowing through Mosul city. Since Mosul city is located at the river mouth upstream, thus any variation in its quality can certainly affect all the cities and /or downstream river water consumers including the capital Baghdad, the most heavily populated city in Iraq. As the pollutant loading is high in the mentioned reach, the dilution and self‑ purification process possessed by the river, especially in low flow periods might be inadequate to preserve and maintain a reliable and adequate water quality in the river Tigris. Environmental legislation and laws set up by the authorities involved in the regulations and protection of the environment have to be actuated and implemented over a national scale urgently and adequately.
Keywords: River Tigris, Pollutant Variation in, Pollutant Modeling, Water Quality Index WQI.
Title: Pollutant Variation through Tigris River in Mosul City
Author: Naufal A. Al-Masri, Mazin N. Fadhel
International Journal of Interdisciplinary Research and Innovations
ISSN 2348-1226 (online), ISSN 2348-1218 (print)
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