| Title | Groundwater chemical status assessment considering geochemical background: an example from Northern Latium (Central Italy) |
| Abstract | The evaluation of the chemical status of groundwater bodies, pursuant to the European Groundwater Directive 2006/118/EC, requires the assessment of the natural background levels when concentration exceeds the national standards. In large part of Italy, including the case-study region Latium, the presence of substances of natural origin has long been recognized. Nonetheless, a systematic assessment of background levels is still missing. Guidelines have been published both at the European and Italian level, but there are still unanswered questions, including the appropriate geographical scale, the time and spatial variation. In this paper, the evaluation of the groundwater chemical status at the groundwater body scale for the Latium region for the above-mentioned elements is presented. We used the preselection method, choosing the 95th percentile of the preselected datasets for various groundwater bodies. Results show that the natural background levels differ at the groundwater body scale reflecting the complexity of the geological asset. At a smaller scale, the variation of the background even at short distances may be dramatic, and this should be considered especially when dealing with site scale assessment. Conversely, the time variation of the considered parameters seems to be modest. In the case-study region, the chemical status assessment considering the background levels would result "good" as for the exceedances of arsenic and fluoride, solving the problem of erroneous classification of water bodies characterized by contamination of natural origin. |
| Source | Rendiconti lincei. Scienze fisiche e naturali 27 (1), pp. 59–66 |
| Keywords | ArsenicFluorideVolcanic aquiferWater qualityDPSIR |
| Journal | Rendiconti lincei. Scienze fisiche e naturali |
| Editor | Springer Verlag Italia, Milano, Italia |
| Year | 2016 |
| Type | Articolo in rivista |
| DOI | 10.1007/s12210-015-0473-7 |
| Authors | Preziosi, Elisabetta; Rossi, David; Parrone, Daniele; Ghergo, Stefano |
| Text | 374746 2016 10.1007/s12210 015 0473 7 ISI Web of Science WOS 000371256500008 Arsenic Fluoride Volcanic aquifer Water quality DPSIR Groundwater chemical status assessment considering geochemical background an example from Northern Latium Central Italy Preziosi, Elisabetta; Rossi, David; Parrone, Daniele; Ghergo, Stefano Natl Res Council Italy; Univ Rome Tre The evaluation of the chemical status of groundwater bodies, pursuant to the European Groundwater Directive 2006/118/EC, requires the assessment of the natural background levels when concentration exceeds the national standards. In large part of Italy, including the case study region Latium, the presence of substances of natural origin has long been recognized. Nonetheless, a systematic assessment of background levels is still missing. Guidelines have been published both at the European and Italian level, but there are still unanswered questions, including the appropriate geographical scale, the time and spatial variation. In this paper, the evaluation of the groundwater chemical status at the groundwater body scale for the Latium region for the above mentioned elements is presented. We used the preselection method, choosing the 95th percentile of the preselected datasets for various groundwater bodies. Results show that the natural background levels differ at the groundwater body scale reflecting the complexity of the geological asset. At a smaller scale, the variation of the background even at short distances may be dramatic, and this should be considered especially when dealing with site scale assessment. Conversely, the time variation of the considered parameters seems to be modest. In the case study region, the chemical status assessment considering the background levels would result good as for the exceedances of arsenic and fluoride, solving the problem of erroneous classification of water bodies characterized by contamination of natural origin. 27 Published version Articolo in rivista Springer Verlag Italia 2037 4631 Rendiconti lincei. Scienze fisiche e naturali Rendiconti lincei. Scienze fisiche e naturali Rend. lincei, Sci. fis. nat. Rendiconti lincei. Scienze fisiche e naturali. Rendiconti lincei danieleparrone PARRONE DANIELE stefano.ghergo GHERGO STEFANO elisabetta.preziosi PREZIOSI ELISABETTA david rossi ROSSI DAVID TA.P04.005.012 Stato quali quantitativo dei corpi idrici sotterranei e interazione con i corpi idrici superficiali |
