A study of changes in the chemical properties of soil due to irrigation by polluted river water (army canal in Baghdad)‎ for a long period

Abstract EN

Soil is an essential natural resource for support of human life, but with time, its degradation has been constantly increasing due to the deposition of pollutants.

The aim of this research is to study the changes of the chemical properties of the soil which has been irrigated for a long period with polluted river water, and the effect of each property on the other properties.

The study was on the agricultural soil besides Army canal in Baghdad city which is irrigated by the canal water.

This canal ends at Al-Rustamia wastewater treatment plant.

Samples of soil which is irrigated and not irrigated with canal water were taken.

The samples were analyzed to find the chemical properties such as heavy metals (Pb, Zn, Ni, Cr, Cd) and other parameters of soil (SO4, Cl, TSS, pH, OM).

Samples were taken from points far from the canal (non-irrigated soil), the other samples have decreasing distances from the canal bank and the last one is just at the river margin (irrigated soil) to find out the differences in chemical properties.

The relation between soil concentrations of heavy metals and the other parameters in the chemical properties of the soil was studied the following results were found: A positive correlation between SO4 and OM, TSS and EC was found, also Zn and Pb with SO4, Zn and Pb with OM.

Also, a comparison was done between the properties of irrigated soil and the properties of non-irrigated soil.

Results show that Pb and Ni increased out of the allowable limits, Ec and TSS increment has also been found especially in the non-irrigated soil.