Identification of Water Resource Potential Zones of Karu River Basin Using Remote Sensing and Gis Techniques in Purulia District, West Bengal [India]

Abstract

Remote Sensing and GIS tools broadly help hydrologists to delineate the water resource potential zones for watershed development and management. Water is a valuable natural resource in our daily life. It is used for domestic as well as agricultural purposes. It’s amount varies from season to season. It is plenty during the rainy season, but in the dry season, it is scarce. Assessment of the potential zones of water resources is extremely important for protecting water quality and managing surface/groundwater systems. Water resource potential zones are demarcated with the help of Remote Sensing and Geographical Information System (GIS) techniques. In this study, the standard methodology is used to determine the potential of water resources using the integration of RS & GIS techniques. Different parameters that can be considered for identifying water resource potential zones, such as slope, drainage frequency, drainage density, geology, groundwater level, soil, surface water bodies and land use/land cover, are generated using satellite data and a survey of India (SoI) toposheets of scale 1:50000. Suitable ranks are assigned of each category of these parameters. A different thematic map of each parameter is prepared using an ordered weighted averaging technique in Qgis. Finally, a composite map is prepared by assigning all parameters to identify the water resource potential zone. These are classified into five categories: very poor, poor, moderate, good and excellent. This suggested methodology has been applied to achieve the goal of the selected study area in the Purulia district, West Bengal. Water resource potential zones will be useful for the identification of suitable locations for agriculture and domestic use of surface and underground water.